


If you can find it

by rainbowsnmelons



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: AU where they live in completely made-up countries and they have magic, Gen, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, Magic, Panic Attacks, Parental Abuse, Post-War Trauma, Traumatic Backstories, Urban Fantasy, mentioned past abuse, racist antagonists, some violence, talking about feelings, xenophobic antagonists
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:02:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26837923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainbowsnmelons/pseuds/rainbowsnmelons
Summary: They come from different backgrounds and different countries; they have different magics. But they find themselves on similar paths, learning how to heal and trust again, in a world that is struggling to do the same.This chapter: There are tears and some raised voices and things go about as well as they do when you compromise.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 22





	1. Prelude

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I’ve got about 15,000 words of this atm, so I figured it’s about time to start posting it and get some motivation before I lose it xD ^^;
> 
> This is also just me indulging myself here too, so please forgive me if it gets too fluffy/sappy.
> 
> No pairings cause I’m not really here for the romance, but there’s plenty of love and care <3 even if some of them are snarky about it :P

Meeting Sho had changed a lot of things for Ohno, not the least of which was his apartment.

Sho had brought his ambitions, and dreams and hopes and about 12 other things that Ohno hadn’t even bothered to consider in years—brought them all to the table and looked at Ohno so expectantly, so hopefully that Ohno had found himself agreeing to be part of it, and to (kind of) trust this 15 year old with himself.

At the time, it had seemed like a reckless chance to take (not that there was anyone to scold him). But looking back later, he knew better, knew it had been the last-second course correction that had gotten him back on his feet and looking forward again.

Sho’s told him it was a team effort, but Ohno was pretty certain that if that was the case, he wasn’t doing his fair share. But either way, he’d found a bit of a purpose again through Sho, and he knew his younger self would have been surprised to hear how grateful he was for that.

If meeting Sho had gotten him back on track, then meeting Nino had been like a challenge. Like Life had looked him in the eye and said, ‘You think you've got your shit together? Well then it’s time to level up.’

Sho had been easy mode, bending over backwards to help Ohno remember how to be a person again. Nino was the next level up, tricky and complicated to figure out. Ohno had had to put (some) effort into communicating. Which ended up being good experience, because if he’d met Jun first, he’d probably have wiped out immediately. Jun was definitely expert level. 

That left Aiba to be the bonus round you could only unlock when you succeeded at the normal (Nino) level. One of those ones where they were confusing and weird at first until suddenly you figured out the trick and after that it was super easy and fun, and you could get a lot of points.

The gaming metaphors were also probably Nino’s fault, since he was always playing while Ohno napped on the couch. Some sort of osmosis or something.

Regardless, Ohno met Sho, and then Ohno met Nino, but things really started to get going when Sho met Nino (expert level and bonus round included).


	2. Ch 1: Port in a Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for waiting, here’s the first chapter :)

“Aiba and I need a place to stay,” Nino’s voice sounded tired on the other end of the line, and Ohno frowned, twisting his fingers in his shirt before glancing down the hall to Sho’s closed door. “I know it’s late, but that _slevin_ of a landlord kicked us out and we just paid rent yesterday, fucking-” He cut himself off with a frustrated noise, and Ohno started moving, grabbing a few boxes off the table to put them in the recycle pile, then giving the dishes in the sink a despairing look. “I don’t...ugh, this sucks. Usually we’d make do, but this idiot got himself sick, and we at least need a place for the night, or, well, a couple maybe, at least until he can stand up straight-”

“It’s okay, uh, I mean for now,” Ohno interrupted. “I can’t say anything about long term til Sho-kun wakes up, um, but I’m sure he won’t mind the night at least.” He started running the water in the sink, hoping it would at least look like he had started the dishes before now.

“We appreciate it,” was Nino’s quiet reply, and Ohno’s stomach twisted a little uncomfortably at the straightforward gratitude. It really wasn’t Nino’s style.

“Do you need help getting here?” Ohno asked, wondering what they had been able to bring with them.

“No, I mean, it’s raining…” Nino trailed off, and Ohno turned to look out the window, where he couldn’t quite see the rain, but a sizable puddle was forming on the balcony.

“I’ve got an umbrella. Where are you?”

There was quiet for a long moment, then Nino finally answered. “We’ll be at the park in about 5 minutes.”

“Okay, I’ll meet you there.” Ohno hung up the phone, then grabbed some laundry off the couch and threw it in his room on the way to grab a couple of Sho’s raincoats from the closet. He took a chance to peek in at Sho, but the other man looked like he hadn’t moved since Ohno’s last peek, still wrapped around his pillow and facing away from the door. Ohno couldn’t imagine him having a problem letting guests stay somewhere dry for the night, but he still offered a quiet apology for deciding without him, then closed the door again.

It ended up being close to 10 minutes before Ohno got to the park, and he squinted as he looked around in the rain, the streetlights making tiny hazy globes in the darkness. He was at the main entrance, and Nino’s usual spot was further inside. Without entering, he wouldn’t be able to see if they were there, but he didn’t think they would have gone in.

He peered around for a moment, before some odd movement down the street caught his eye. He stared at it and the strange shadow resolved itself into two figures walking quite close together and carrying a lot of bags. They weren’t moving particularly fast, and Ohno decided to head towards them.

A good decision, it turned out, as part way there the two figures stopped moving, and Ohno was the one to reach them first. He didn’t recognize one of them, sitting slumped against the park fence, but it was definitely Nino crouched in front of the other, his face unmistakable even when he was completely soaked.

“Oh-chan,” Nino greeted him with a small smile, “Sorry, we were just taking a bit of a breather.” He sounded cheerful enough, but there was a hint of a tremor in his voice. Ohno frowned at him, wordlessly shoving a raincoat in his face. He had ended up wearing one himself instead of using an umbrella if there were things to carry.

“Can’t even say hi,” Nino grumbled. He took the raincoat, then shifted to his knees so he could pull his friend up. “Ma-chan, here, put this on.”

The other boy blinked his eyes open slowly, and didn’t resist as Nino tugged his arms through the sleeves and fastened the snaps for him. Ohno waited for Nino to tug the hood up before pushing another raincoat into Nino’s face. Nino rolled his eyes, but put it on himself, then nodded to a backpack and a large rolling suitcase.

“Could you grab those? I’ll get this guy back up.” 

“Kay,” Ohno mumbled belatedly, shrugging the bag on and watching as Nino leaned back into his friend—Aiba? Nino took one of his hands between his smaller ones, and Ohno watched as a soft yellow glow spread from Nino’s fingertips to sink into the other’s skin. After a moment Aiba shifted slightly, eyes opening a little more. When Nino pulled him up, he stood, but he staggered almost immediately, and Nino had to quickly move to support him. Ohno caught a couple murmured sounds, but couldn’t make them out.

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” Nino responded, hefting a bag up on the shoulder that wasn’t keeping Aiba up. “We just gotta walk a bit more, then we’ll be there.” His persistently cheerful tone made Ohno’s stomach twist again, then even more at the apologetic look he shot Ohno.

“Right, yeah, this way.” Ohno started off, pulling the suitcase behind him.

By the time they reached the building Ohno had moved to Aiba’s other side, arm slung around his waist like they’d known each other for years. The taller man was nearly completely out, and whatever magic Nino had been working was clearly not doing the job anymore. Ohno had to shift him to punch in the door code, then nodded for Nino to walk in first, the three of them (well, mostly two) doing an odd sideways shuffle to get inside with all their bags.

“Elevator,” Ohno muttered, and Nino adjusted his direction to head for it, slapping the up button with his free hand. They all looked at the tiny elevator when the doors opened, and he continued, “Uh, I’ll go first? Then you guys meet me on the 5th floor.”

Nino nodded, shifting to take more of Aiba’s weight. Ohno slipped past them with the bags, and hit the button, letting out a soft sigh after the doors had closed. What was it Sho had said? Giving a shit was like a full-time job or something like that, probably a little nicer. Ohno had known he would have to worry about Sho pretty quickly after he met him, but Nino had always seemed so cool, and like he could take care of himself. And now here Ohno was, knots in his stomach over him and some guy whose name he wasn’t entirely sure of yet.

Well, whatever. It was only for a few days.

Ohno wasn’t particularly surprised when the rolling suitcase fell over with a loud thump when they finally got in the apartment—he would have fallen over if he could have too. He was surprised when, barely a moment or two later, as he and Nino were still trying to untangle themselves, the hall light came on. He twisted around to blink in confusion at Sho, standing barefoot in the dress pants and button-down he’d fallen asleep in yesterday.

“Sho-kun,” he started, “Um, this is Nino, and uh, Aiba-san? They needed a place to stay. Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you…” He was pretty surprised by that, honestly. When Sho had a spell, he usually slept for days, and nothing ever seemed to wake him until he was done.

“You didn’t…” Sho muttered distractedly. “I felt...Is he okay?” He was looking at Aiba, still upright mostly due to Nino’s white-knuckled grip on his wrist and shirt.

“He’s sick,” Nino said bluntly, his forced cheer from earlier seeming to have dissipated in the face of exhaustion. “He needs to dry off, warm up, and sleep.”

Sho blinked at him, then nodded. “We can do that. Here, Satoshi, get his shoes.” Ohno did as directed, then helped Sho take Aiba as he got his own shoes off. He left the suitcase for a minute as the two of them got Aiba into the bathroom.

“I can get him some of my clothes for now,” Sho said as they settled Aiba on the toilet seat, and he immediately slumped to put his head down against the sink. “Will you grab some more towels from the closet and start getting him dried off?”

“Yeah...where’s Nino?” Ohno belatedly noticed that there were only three of them in the bathroom.

“Leave him be for a minute,” Sho told him, then left.

“Huh?” Ohno asked. He stood for a moment, then went to get the towels. Peering out into the entrance way, he could see Nino sitting on the floor, head in his hands. In the quiet, Ohno could hear him taking deep, slow breaths, like the kind Sho told him could help if he thought he was going to have a panic attack. He considered that for a moment, then carefully turned back around. He thought Sho had been right about leaving him alone—Ohno knew from experience that misguided care could be a slap in the face when you were hurting.

He kept an ear out all the same as he got the towels, and snagged some clothes of his own that seemed close to Nino’s size, then headed back to the bathroom.

By the time Nino rejoined them, Sho had brought some clothes and gone again to get some tea brewing, and Ohno had gotten most of Aiba’s wet clothes off. 

“Can we put him in the shower for a minute?” Nino asked, and Ohno nodded, stealing a glance at him as they did. But Nino was composed as ever, and, after getting his own socks and jeans off, slipped in the shower behind Aiba. “I’ll get him from here,” Nino said, and Ohno took the hint, excusing himself to go find Sho.

“He’s your park man with the guitar?” Sho asked him, staring fixedly at the kettle. Ohno, used to Sho’s eternal battles with appliances, simply nodded. “Nino, right? And...Aiba?”

“Think so. I’ve only met Nino, but he mentioned his roommate a few times. I told them they could stay til Aiba’s better, at least.”

“If he needs to see a doctor, we could call someone tomorrow.” The kettle’s button popped up, and Sho leaned forward to grab it. Ohno frowned, realizing there weren’t any cups or tea bags out. Sho apparently realized it at the same time, freezing in place with a curse. Ohno reached up and grabbed some mugs from the cupboard above his head, then got some tea bags from the jar on the counter while Sho poured the water.

“Well, Nino’s a healer, so.” The way Sho tensed at those words was a subtle movement, just enough for Ohno to realize what he was thinking. “Oh, um, but—“ he fumbled for a response, but was saved by Nino entering, looking less like a drowned rat than he had before, Ohno’s shirt slipping a bit off one slim shoulder.

“Unlicensed,” he corrected Ohno, who blinked, then shrugged.

“Still. You’d get pissy if we called a doctor for him.” Nino made a face, but nodded.

Sho finished pouring the water and snagged the tea bags to put in the mugs before turning to face Nino. 

“I’m Sho, nice to meet you. We don’t have much here, but you guys are welcome to stay as long as you need.”

“Nino is fine, and thanks. We owe you guys.” Nino yawned and stretched a bit, and Sho frowned, glancing behind him.

“Uh, is your friend all right in the shower?”

“Oh, he’s passed out on the floor now. I was coming to see if we could borrow a blanket? I think ours all got wet…” Nino scrubbed a hand through his hair, looking rueful.

“The floor?” Sho’s voice squeaked a little bit. “He can’t sleep on the _floor_.”

Nino looked amused. “Well, he managed it somehow.”

“Oh for, Ohno-kun, take care of the tea, I’ll get some futons out.” Sho hurried out of the room still looking scandalized, and Ohno couldn’t help feeling a bit relieved at the slow grin that spread across Nino’s face.

“He seems fun,” was all Nino said but Ohno could hear the promise in it. “He looks like a punk with his hair like that though.”

“He’s a straight-A kid who likes to rebel a little bit sometimes,” Ohno told him, and Nino laughed.

“Does he take it down when mom visits?”

“Nah. She scolds him if he does it sloppy though.”

“She sounds great.”

~~~

Sho stood in the kitchen, drying the mugs he had just washed. Now that their guests were more or less settled, he could feel exhaustion creeping back in from the corners of his eyes. If he slept now, he would surely be out for another day at least. He was going to have to sleep soon, regardless. But there was a discordant beat mixed in with the normal pulse of the night, and it was leaving Sho restless and tense. It was the same one that had woken him in the first place, when these two new faces had first staggered into their apartment.

A gnawing worry, occasionally festering into a wave of panic. In his initial confusion after waking up, he’d thought it was Ohno, and he’d staggered out of bed wondering what had happened. It had made more sense when he’d found them at the door—Ohno, surprisingly uneasy for all that he usually ignored everyone around him, Aiba, barely a flicker of awareness, and Nino. 

It was still Nino now, a low knot of tension in Sho’s chest pushing him to go try and fix it. It was hard to know with a stranger what would help and what would send walls even higher, but Sho would never be able to sleep like this, and he doubted Nino would either.

“Are you going to talk to Nino?” Ohno asked, knees pulled up to his chin as he worked on a sketch at the kitchen table. He wasn’t looking at Sho, but that uneasy feeling was still there. He was worried, and a small part of Sho was almost happy at this sign of progress. Ohno’s walls were some of the toughest Sho had ever known, and it still amazed him that Ohno had trusted him enough to let him in. Now here was another person who’d maybe managed the same, perhaps through stealth rather than Sho’s own admittedly blunt and straightforward approach.

But the fact was his worry was well-founded, and it really wouldn’t do for Sho to try and weasel his way out of helping just because of personal...failures.

“Do you think I should try?” He asked, finally setting the mug down. “He seemed like he might react badly if I pushed earlier.”

“Well, they’re back on solid ground now,” Ohno said, shifting his position in his chair. He still didn’t look at Sho, but Sho wasn’t upset. He knew the difference between apathy and cautiousness, and this was clearly Ohno trying to keep himself safe.

“Yeah…” Sho murmured. That was the thing, that Nino had gotten himself and his friend out of the storm, to shelter, but he still didn’t feel safe. Perhaps too used to the other shoe dropping, and there might not be anything Sho could do about that (old wounds ache as they will, after all). But if there was something else, a more tangible fear—well it would almost be his duty to try and amend it.

“Or I could try?” Ohno offered after a long moment, but it was clearly a reluctant offer.

Sho could respect the effort put into that, respect that Ohno was willing to put himself into waters deeper than he was comfortable with. He wanted to fix things, and that made up Sho’s mind.

“I’ll go. I won’t be able to sleep otherwise.” 

That got Ohno’s attention, and he twisted around to glance at Sho, but didn’t say anything for a moment.

“Will you sleep longer this time, do you think?” he asked finally after he had turned back around. It was a light, careful question, but Sho could feel the concern tinged with sadness behind it.

“Maybe,” Sho acknowledged, “but it is what it is.”

Another glance from Ohno, and Sho steeled himself for the expected ‘Why don’t you ask him to try and fix you?’ with muscles tensed.

But Ohno didn’t say anything, and Sho let himself relax, taking a few deep breaths before walking out of the kitchen and towards the guest room.

He grabbed one more blanket before gently knocking at the door.

Nino opened it and raised an eyebrow.

“Hi,” he greeted Sho, turning around to go sit on the futon Sho had gotten out for him. Aiba was curled up asleep on the other, hair either still damp from the shower or from sweat, Sho wasn’t sure. Belongings were strewn about the room to dry—not much, Sho noticed, but everything looked like it was mostly in good condition.

More pressing was the spike in anxiety Sho had felt when he’d knocked at the door, and he stayed at the doorway for a moment, hesitant to make it worse.

“I found another blanket—“ 

“We’ll be gone as soon as he’s better,” Nino interrupted him, his gaze focused on his hands, “so, please, just til then…”

“It’s fine, really,” Sho got out, despite being caught off guard. “Stay as long as you need.”

“...Maybe I’m reading things wrong,” Nino shot him a glance, then continued, “but you’ve been giving me weird looks since we got here. I don’t know if Oh-chan noticed or cared about us being Karnian, but if that’s gonna be an issue we’ll be out of your hair as soon as he’s able.” His hands clenched in his lap as he spoke, and it clearly took him some effort to relax them again.

Sho had opened his mouth to respond to the first part of Nino’s response, but found himself floundering as the conversation took a turn. He’d noticed the nose and eyes that gave both away as being from the former country of Karn, but hadn’t thought anything of it. Nino’s fluctuating emotions were distracting Sho as well, peaking high before dropping low. That was probably the other boy trying to keep them in check, but it gave Sho an idea of where to start.

“I’m an empath,” he met Nino’s gaze evenly when it shot up to him. “Apologies for not mentioning it sooner. I didn’t intend to be staring at you, I was honestly just concerned. And neither Ohno nor I are in the habit of worrying about where people come from, I assure you.” 

There was a long, tense silence. Sho could tell Nino was doing some fast thinking, and judging. But finally, finally Sho could feel Nino relax, like a twisted-up spring being allowed to return to its normal shape. The small smile he gave then seemed like the most honest he’d been with Sho the whole night.

“Well that’s good to hear. And sorry for worrying you. I don’t know much about how empathy works, but it can’t have been fun dealing with me freaking out this whole time.”

Sho carefully stepped into the room, laying the blanket at the foot of Nino’s futon, then took a chance and sat next to it. “I was the most worried when I thought you were Satoshi. He barely ever registers for me, so I thought something horrible had happened.”

Nino snickered. “I asked him if he shuts off sometimes to conserve power or something. He took so long to answer I thought it must be true.” Nino shifted to sit back against the wall, stance much more open than earlier, and Sho grinned, glad to find some common ground. Nino continued, “I’m afraid I’m probably going to be a bit more annoying than him. And, well…” He nodded at Aiba with a rueful look. “I apologize in advance for this mess of emotions and energy pretending to be a person.”

“I’m sure we’ll manage somehow,” Sho responded, feeling the warm fondness behind Nino’s words. He hesitated, then continued, “Are you sure you’ll be okay?”

“You _are_ nosy, aren’t you?” Nino snorted, then shrugged, his gaze dropping back to Aiba as his words softened. “I’ll be okay when he’s okay. Sounds stupidly sappy, but he’s better at handling these sorts of things.” He waved a hand around to indicate their current situation. “I panic and freak out about things that could go wrong, he shrugs and says it’ll work out somehow, then trips over his own two feet. He’s just not holding up his end of it this time.”

Aiba chose that moment to roll halfway out of his futon, muttering in his sleep. It did sound like Karnian, and for a moment his eyes opened, looking around blankly. Nino leaned forward to nudge him back into place, murmuring that everything was fine, and to go back to sleep. He used the same language, and Sho listened with interest, most of his experience with it coming from a textbook.

When Aiba was settled again, Nino looked back at Sho. “So,” he started, but he was interrupted by Ohno at the door.

“Sho-chan?”

Sho tilted his head back and waved.

“I thought you might have fallen asleep in here,” Ohno slipped into the room and moved forward until his knees were bumping Sho’s back.

“I’m tired enough that it’s not an unreasonable assumption,” Sho admitted. He put a hand up as he shifted, and Ohno grabbed it, helping him back to his feet. The way the room spun a little as he stood underscored his statement, and he did his best to ignore the way Nino’s gaze sharpened. Maybe the other two would be out of the apartment before that conversation ever had to happen. 

Sho could only hope.

Ohno didn’t say anything more, just kept within reach if Sho needed to grab him. Close enough to help, but not so close that Sho wanted to push him away. Sho appreciated that about him.

“Good night then,” he told Nino, who nodded.

“You too. And thanks again, to both of you.” 

Sho smiled, then turned towards the door, snorting when Ohno suddenly blurted out his own “Good night” like he’d just remembered how to talk.

“There’s the power switch,” Nino remarked dryly, and Sho laughed. Ohno actually seemed a bit pleased as well, and he was even smiling a bit as they closed the door.

Once they’d started making their way back down the hall, Sho turned to face him.

“Thanks,” he said, wondering if Ohno would understand. Ohno’s face was unreadable though, so he continued, “You never try to make me let you help. I appreciate it.”

“That doesn’t sound very helpful anyway,” Ohno said wrinkling his nose. “And I learned everything from you, so.”

Sho considered that, remembering nights of just waiting and hoping Ohno would come to him for help. He hadn’t realized that Ohno had been aware of it, at least not to that extent.

“Is Nino gonna be okay?” Ohno asked as they reached his room.

“I think so. He said he would be as long as his friend was.”

“That’s good.”

They were quiet for a moment, then Sho sighed.

“I’ll probably be out til at least...what day is it?”

“Wednesday night.”

“Friday then, or maybe Saturday. Sorry.”

“It’s fine. Sorry you got woken up.”

“I think that worked out for the best anyway.”

“Yeah, well. Night.”

“Good night.” Sho closed his door with half a wave, then shucked his work clothes (he didn’t even remember going to sleep in them) for pajamas. He didn’t bother to set an alarm, just turned off the light and wrapped himself in his blanket, almost immediately falling asleep.


	3. Ch 2: A Round of Meet & Greets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Slowly depleting my stock of chapters lol. Need to write more to make up for it xD

It took Aiba a minute to realize that the talking platypus with the yellow shoes had been a dream, and he frowned as he blinked heavy eyelids open to see an unfamiliar room. He let his eyes travel up, down, and around, then shifted slightly. He was on a futon, and the sun was coming in through a window in the wall by his head.

The room continued to look unfamiliar and the platypus was gone from his mind as he slowly sat up. Okay, he thought to himself, no need to panic yet. What had he been doing before he slept?

He didn’t actually remember sleeping though, and he tried to make himself stay calm and take another look around. There was their big suitcase against the wall, open with most of their stuff strewn about the floor. His own bag was near the foot of his futon, and it looked like it had been emptied out. There was another futon next to his, and though it didn’t look like anyone had used it recently, Nino’s bag and phone were on top of it. 

Aiba blinked. Nino. He had half a memory now, Nino yelling curses at their landlord, who had fired them back at triple speed. Aiba had mostly wanted them to be quiet, curled in his blankets with his head pounding like a gong. Finally, the landlord had left, and Nino had plopped down next to him, still muttering about bastard weasels. A few fingers had found their way to Aiba’s forehead, chasing away some of the gonginess with yellow shimmers, and Aiba had opened his eyes to Nino’s apology. 

“Sorry,” Nino had said, looking like he meant it. “But we’re gonna have to leave.”

And they had, Aiba assumed, and Nino had gotten them some place to stay. It didn’t look like a hotel, but—

His eyes tracked over to a doorway, and he jumped to see Nino leaning against it, wearing unfamiliar clothes and with a glass of water in his hand.

“Actually awake this time?” Nino asked, and Aiba frowned.

“Huh?” Nino rolled his eyes and shook his head. “Where are we?”

“Oh-chan’s place,” Nino shifted, and moved to sit on the other futon, pushing the water into Aiba’s chest. “Or maybe Sho-chan’s place, he seemed like a rich kid. We’ve been here since Wednesday night, it’s Friday morning now.” Aiba took the water, a little surprised at the way his hand trembled.

“Oh-chan? The guy with the dirty fingers? And who’s Sho-chan?” He was a little less surprised to hear the day, a few vague memories of sleeping a lot the day before starting to resurface.

“Why in the world would you remember that of all things? And don’t just hold it, drink!” Nino scowled at him, and Aiba scowled back.

“You said it, and I’ve never met the guy so?” He was tempted not to drink out of spite, but Nino narrowed his eyes and Aiba gave in. He was thoroughly distracted by the water for a moment, suddenly realizing that he was parched, and he would have downed the whole glass if Nino hadn’t pulled it back down.

“Sho-chan lives here with Oh-chan. He’s mostly been asleep since we got here so I haven’t spoken to him much. Great hair though.”

Aiba tugged at the glass and Nino let him have it with only a “slowly” warning. He complied, drinking the rest of the water at a more leisurely pace as Nino put a hand to Aiba’s forehead.

“Your fever’s gone,” he informed Aiba, letting his hand drop, “but you barely ate anything yesterday and you’ll probably pass out if you try to do anything more than walk a few paces. So don’t. Your work isn’t expecting you til next week so don’t worry about that. There’s soup in the fridge, have some of that, and don’t bother the nice people letting us stay in their apartment.”

Aiba nodded obediently, then frowned. “Are you going somewhere?”

“Some of us did  _ not _ spend all day sleeping yesterday, or even last night or the night before,” Nino informed him, flopping down on his futon and wiggling his way under the blanket. “So I’ll be catching up on that.”

Aiba grinned, “Aw, Nino, thanks for taking care of me, that’s so kind!”

“Who said anything about you?” Nino huffed, rolling to face the wall. “One of my games had an online event going on, and I had to get the top score.” 

“Your ears are red,” Aiba said with a laugh, and Nino hmphed, pulling his blanket up to hide them. Aiba let himself fall on top of Nino, hugging his friend while the other boy squawked at him, eventually kicking him back to his own futon.

“I’m sick of seeing your face, go away,” the Nino-lump under the covers told him. Aiba kept grinning, very aware that Nino had snuck in his own hug while they were wrestling. “And if you stand up too fast and fall on me I will kick you again.”

“Okay, okay.” Aiba patted Nino-lump on the butt, then took Nino’s advice and slowly got to his feet. Definitely good advice, he thought to himself as he wavered and had to grab the wall over Nino’s futon to keep his balance. He could see one eye peeking out from the top of the blankets, and he waved with his other hand, still holding the glass. Nino huffed and vanished again, and Aiba winced as he realized he’d spilled the last bit of water on the futon. “Don’t worry about that, it’ll dry,” he whispered, and clambered his way out of the room.

“What—“ was the last thing he heard from Nino before he shut the door behind him, though a soft thump probably meant that Nino had thrown a pillow at him.

Turning around, he was faced with the abrupt reality of still not really knowing where he was. He glanced around the hallway, then down at the glass in his hand.

“Okay. Kitchen,” he decided, and his stomach rumbled a little. Great, decision made. 

There were a few other closed doors in the hallway, and he gave them curious looks as he passed, then stopped in place to stare at a giant painting that took up a lot of the wall between one room and another.

A “wow” slipped from his mouth as he took it in, fields of grass that faded together in the background to almost look like the ocean.

It was beautiful, and Aiba’s impression of big, beautiful paintings was that they were things that rich people bought. But he remembered a bit more now, riding in a tiny elevator with Nino (“we’re literally almost there, I’ll be so mad at you if you pass out now and also I will probably drop you because you are  _ heavy _ —“). This was definitely an apartment, and not one that looked like it belonged to a super rich person.

Definitely bigger than his and Nino’s place though, and Aiba was willing to bet the heating here worked so that was a plus. Maybe these people just saved up to buy a nice painting?

A noise escaped him when he found another one in the living room, this one a pelican standing on a dock, mid-meal and giving an unimpressed look to the viewer. The painter had done the bird justice, Aiba noted approvingly, and not tried to make it look unnaturally pretty for the sake of the picture.

He leaned in to meet the bird’s gaze, tilting his head a bit to match it, then jumped about a foot in the air when he caught sight of someone standing behind him.

“Ack!” His legs buckled when he landed, and he pinwheeled, trying not to crash into the painting or break the glass. He ended up falling backwards, and landing solidly in the stranger’s grip. “Oh, sorry!” He leaned back to meet the other’s gaze.

“I thought you were Sho-kun,” was the response, and Aiba considered that, then apologized again.

“Sorry?”

He found himself being carefully pulled back up, and he got his feet back under him, wincing at how shaky his balance felt. Maybe the other guy noticed too, because he started pushing Aiba towards the sofa, and Aiba complied, sitting with some relief (nothing important broken today, good job!).

“You’re Aiba-chan?” The stranger asked, sitting back on an armchair next to the sofa. Aiba stared at him, then tried,

“Oh-chan?”

A moment of silence, then Aiba giggled. “He calls everyone with ‘chan’. I don’t even know your whole name!”

“Ohno, but Oh-chan’s fine. Or whatever.” Ohno shrugged and scratched his nose.

“Aiba is my name so you’re right there.” He looked down at the glass in his hand. “Can you show me where the kitchen is? I’ve got this, and Nino said something about soup?”

Ohno nodded and stood up, watching him warily as he did the same. Aiba took a few wobbly steps, pleased to feel a bit steadier than before, but Ohno didn’t seem convinced. He moved to grab Aiba’s free arm, and Aiba leaned on him with another apology.

Ohno shrugged. “Easier than before,” and Aiba went red. 

“Oh shoot, I’m sorry! Nino told me not to go to work on Wednesday but it wasn’t that bad in the morning but then I almost passed out in the tiger enclosure, and my boss called Nino, and he came and yelled at me and took me home, but then we got kicked out anyway...huh, I don’t actually know why we got kicked out though. And wow, your fingers really are pretty dirty huh?”

Ohno stared at him, then glanced down at the paint smudges on his fingers. “Was Nino complaining about that? I do wash them…”

“Eh, he’s finicky. So you paint? Wait, did you paint those?” Aiba twisted around to look back at the paintings, and nearly knocked both of them over in the process.

“Here, just—sit down.” Ohno sounded a little stressed, and Aiba quickly closed his mouth, sitting where he was told. ‘Don’t annoy the nice people letting us stay in their apartment’, that’s what Nino had said. Whoops. He watched as Ohno left the room, then carefully set the glass down on the kitchen table next to his chair. The table was a little big for the room, but very cute, Aiba thought, with sky blue and white pieces interlocking and twining about each other. Near his seat, there was a stack of papers and a tablet. The papers had a lot of words that Aiba would bet even Nino would have some trouble reading, and he quickly looked instead at the flowers (plastic) decorating the window sill.

“Here,” Ohno reappeared with a steaming bowl in one hand and a jug in the other. He put the bowl down, and Aiba’s stomach growled. The jug he used to refill the glass with water, before sitting across from Aiba.

“Oh, thank you. Uh…” Aiba glanced around for a moment surreptitiously before clearing his throat. “Sorry, did you have a spoon I could—“

“Oh,” Ohno blinked down at the table, then got up. “Sorry, I left it over there…” He left and came back again, this time with another glass and a spoon which he handed to Aiba, filling the glass from the jug for himself.

“Thanks so much. For everything, I mean. Not just the spoon. Well the spoon too, but—“

“It’s gonna get cold,” Ohno interrupted.

“Sorry!”

  
  


It was only when Aiba took a shower later that he realized he was wearing borrowed clothes, and he had to track Ohno down again to see what he should do with them.

“Eh? Just make a laundry pile or something.” Ohno definitely didn’t look like he particularly cared, flopped in a strange position on an armchair with his sketchbook. (Aiba had at least managed to confirm that Ohno had been the one to make the paintings that were on display. He’d had a million more questions to ask, but the blank look on Ohno’s face had deterred him. Maybe later.)

“...right,” Aiba said, frowning down at the clothes in his arms. It wasn’t that the idea upset him, but it seemed like the clothes didn’t belong to Ohno. What if Sho-san (what was his last name?) didn’t like his clothes being treated like that?

He ended up going back to his and Nino’s room and folding the clothes in a slightly more legitimate-looking laundry pile. Then he sat on his futon and sighed, glancing over at Nino. His friend was completely out, breathing deep and even with a little whistle on each exhale. Aiba was tempted to draw on his face, but felt bad when he remembered Nino had been taking care of him. Also he didn’t know where any markers were.

His phone appeared to have finally given up the ghost (he vaguely remembered the rain and figured that was the cause) so he didn’t really have anything to distract himself with. And even he could tell that going outside would be a bad idea when he couldn’t walk without a wall to lean on.

He ended up back in the living room, muttering a quiet ‘excuse me’ to Ohno as he sat on the couch. Ohno gave him a blank look from a completely different position than before (it still looked uncomfortable). Aiba tried stiffly to smile, then looked at his hands, picking at his nails. He twisted around to look at the pelican painting again, remembering a question he’d wanted to ask about the bird. But Ohno’s expression hadn't changed, and Aiba wilted back into the couch.

The ticking of the clock was starting to get annoying and he scowled at it, stealing another look at Ohno. How did he put up with it, he wondered, only to suddenly notice the earbuds in the other man’s ears. Had he had those earlier? He let his head drop back with a rather loud sigh, then jerked it back up when Ohno rolled to stand up. 

Aiba watched as Ohno moved closer, grabbing something off the table. His eyes widened when Ohno held it out to him, and he was surprised to see a tv remote. Ohno dropped it into his hand and nodded to the tv.

“You can watch something, if you want,” he said before throwing himself back on the chair in another strange position.

Aiba nodded in thanks, then turned the tv on, immediately panicking when voices suddenly blared from the tv. It took him what seemed like forever to find the volume control, and he guiltily turned it down, whispering a ‘sorry’ at Ohno. That same face, but Ohno just shrugged.

“Sho-kun,” was all he said, and now Aiba had more questions.

But he turned back to the tv with another nod, and flipped through the channels. The only thing that wasn’t an infomercial was a fishing channel, and he left it there with a soft sigh. Maybe there’d be something about fish he could learn for the zoo, he supposed.

A few minutes later found him completely asleep against the couch cushions.

  
  
  


The room was dark when Nino woke up, and he blinked in confusion, then rolled over in a panic, reaching out only to find an empty futon. He froze for a moment, then groaned, falling back to his pillow and rubbing his eyes. Right. Okay.

With a sigh he sat up, and grabbed his phone. When the screen lit up, he frowned to see all the notifications, then groaned again, flopping back to his pillow.  _ Shit. _

He rolled over and sighed, unlocking his phone and opening his chat with Jun. He had to scroll back through about 20 messages and 3 missed calls, but the content wasn’t particularly surprising. They’d planned on going to some lecture Jun had been interested in, something about magic theory? Nino hadn’t gone to school since he was 8, so he’d doubted his ability to keep up, but Jun had rolled his eyes and insisted Nino was smart enough to follow along. It had been scheduled for this morning, but now it was close to 6 at night, and Jun had apparently moved on from being annoyed to being worried.

“ _ I dropped by your place but it seems like you guys don’t live there anymore? And Aiba’s phone is just going straight to voicemail? Will you please just tell me if you guys are okay?!?” _

“Fuck,” Nino muttered. He sighed and started dialing as he got up, intending to make sure Aiba hadn’t done...well, anything in the past few hours.

The phone rang once as he got out into the hallway, but was immediately picked up and Nino winced at the way Jun answered.

“Nino? Are you okay? Where are you?”

“Hey...Yeah. We’re at a friend’s place.” He trudged down the hall, eyeing Sho’s closed door in suspicion. ‘He’s sleeping’ was all Ohno would say, and it was weird.

“What happened? When did you decide to move?”

Nino huffed. “We didn’t decide anything. That  _ mompfrin  _ took our rent money then threatened to call the cops on us if we weren’t out by midnight.” He squinted as he got to the living room, dark except for a tv playing infomercials. He could just barely make out two figures sprawled on the couch.

“What?! He can’t just—“

“Well he did. And you know the cops would have backed him up regardless.” Finally Nino found a switch and flicked it on, flooding the room with light. Two bodies made unhappy noises and he rolled his eyes.

Jun was the kind of quiet that meant he was furious, and Nino could hear it in his voice when he finally spoke again. “Do you need anything?”

“A new apartment,” Nino said dryly, “preferably for free.” He squeezed his way between Ohno and Aiba on the couch, grabbing the remote to turn the tv off. 

“...was watching that…” Ohno mumbled, and Nino snorted.

“You were watching the inside of your eyelids you mean.”

“Mm, he was snoring,” Aiba agreed, stretching a bit, and rolling over enough to flop an arm over Nino.

Nino scowled down at him as Jun responded, “Can I bring you dinner at least?”

“Uhh...hey, you mind if MatsuJun comes and makes food for us?”

“That’s not what I said,” Jun protested half-heartedly.

“It’s what you meant,” Nino told him sweetly, because they both knew it was. He poked Ohno who made another grumpy noise then shrugged before rolling over himself, squashing his face in Nino’s hip. “Sounds like it’s fine.”

“Great. How many people?”

Nino shot another look at the hallway. “Three, potentially four.” He ignored the doubtful hum from Ohno.

“Okay, what’s the address?”

  
  


After Nino hung up the phone he dragged Aiba off him and made him sit up. Aiba looked sleepy, but he responded promptly to Nino’s questions and promised he hadn’t done anything other than watch tv, eat, and shower. His fever hadn’t come back, and Nino sighed as he let his hand drop.

“Sorry Nino,” Aiba yawned. “I didn’t mean to get sick.”

“I sure hope not,” Nino rolled his eyes. “And don’t apologize for things that aren’t your fault.”

“Sorry...um, no, I meant...um.” Aiba trailed off looking confused. Nino could feel Ohno laugh silently against his hip, and he couldn’t resist the urge to giggle a little himself. 

  
  


When Jun arrived, he grabbed both of them in a death grip, and Nino didn’t complain, knowing Jun had had to have felt more than a little abandoned. Then Jun turned to Ohno and introduced himself with a bow. “I’m Jun Matsumoto, sorry to randomly barge in like this.”

Ohno mumbled out his own name, then wandered back to the sofa, clearly not quite up for conversation yet. Jun gave Nino a questioning look, and didn’t quite look appeased when Nino waved him off, but he didn’t say anything more.

“Um,” Jun held up a full bag from the grocery store Nino knew he liked, “so can I…”

“We’re gonna use the kitchen old man,” Nino spoke over his shoulder.

“Ah.” Ohno’s head popped up. “It’s probably pretty messy.”

Nino waved him off. “I cleaned it yesterday.”

“Oh...when did you do that?” Ohno had sunk back down to the couch, but he still sounded perplexed.

“While you were napping after lunch. Is this how you live every day?”

Jun eyed them, then shrugged and moved into the kitchen.

“I have an exhibition next month. I need to make more stuff.”

“Then why are you sleeping?”

“Inspiration,” Ohno responded with an idle wave.

Nino snorted, “Right.” He followed Jun into the kitchen, then gave Aiba an exasperated look when he followed Nino. “Go sit down.”

“Not by myself!” Aiba whispered, but his arms waved frantically.

“You wouldn’t be by yourself,” Nino told him, moving out of Jun’s way as he explored the utensil drawers. “Ohno’s out there.”

Aiba gave him a wide-eyed ‘that’s the point’ look, and Nino sighed.

“Bring a chair then, and stay out of the way.”

Aiba nodded with relief, and went to get a chair, plopping it noisily in the corner by the toaster.

Jun turned on him with narrow eyes. “Did you get hurt? Were you fighting again?” Aiba pouted at him, shaking his head.

“He caught sick and passed out in the tiger pen,” Nino informed him, and Jun swiveled between them back to Aiba.

“Almost! Almost passed out!”

“That’s not what your boss said.”

“But I didn’t—“

“Whatever,” Jun interrupted, “are you doing better?”

“I’m great!” Aiba gave him a thumbs-up, and Jun gave him a long look, then turned to Nino.

“How is he?”

Nino ignored Aiba’s huff. “He mostly slept it off. He probably won’t eat too much.”

“I’ll eat,” Aiba muttered sulkily.

“Noted,” Jun replied. He got to work cooking after that, directing Nino to cut things up for him, and letting Aiba help with the peeling.

Ohno wandered over when it started smelling good, and Nino tried to get him in the conversation a few times. He mostly just leaned against the wall, but he did throw in an occasional comment. Nino felt like he was throwing and catching the ball for two teams, especially since Aiba was quieter than usual.

Jun was shy too, he remembered suddenly. Even their first conversation had only happened because Nino had snapped, and yelled at tiny stalker Jun to get out from behind that tree already.

But somehow, they got the food together and sat down to eat. 

“Eh, wait, if you were here all day, why didn’t you answer your phones?” Jun asked, twirling pasta on his fork, and Nino shrugged.

“Was asleep.”

“Mine’s dead,” Aiba admitted, chasing a noodle around his plate.

“Crap,” Nino muttered. “Do we have enough to get it fixed?”

“Last time the guy only fixed it cause you healed his finger for him, right? He said it was a piece of junk not worth fixing.”

“Ugh,” Nino made a face.

“I know you had to pay for yours up front Nino, but Aiba-chan should be able to get on a payment plan if he gets a new one,” Jun remarked, and Nino sighed.

“Payments…” he grumbled.

“Besides, aren’t you making videos now for the zoo? You can do a lot with a new phone for that.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” Aiba nodded, looking mostly convinced already. Nino grimaced at the thought of all that money going out the window (even on a payment plan), but with a rather advanced phone himself (to play games of course) he couldn’t complain. And it was Aiba’s money.

“Can you take him to get one tomorrow?” he asked Jun. “I told the boss man I’d come in over the weekend to make up for the past couple days.”

“I can go by myself!” Aiba insisted, but wilted at Jun and Nino’s matching skeptical faces. “Fine, fine.” He chased the noodle around a bit more then sighed, “Sorry MatsuJun, I don’t think I can eat anymore.”

Usually leaving food uneaten was a crime if MatsuJun was present, but he only nodded at Aiba. “Don’t worry about it. And I can come by after my morning lecture tomorrow, around 2pm? But let me know if you don’t feel up to going out.”

“We’re also going to need to figure out how much to pay for staying here,” Nino added, looking to Ohno.

“Hm? Oh, you don’t have to.” Ohno hadn’t been zoning out too far, at least, Nino noted. And he’d eaten two helpings of MatsuJun’s spaghetti, also a good sign.

“As much as I’d be happy to take you up on that, I’m going to wait and talk to your roommate and see what he says,” Nino said finally. He hated the thought of spending more money, but taking advantage of people who’d done them a kindness also rankled.

Ohno just shrugged, and zoned out again, only to briefly come back and add “Thanks for dinner.”

“Thanks for letting these guys stay here,” Jun started, only to frown when Ohno only nodded before picking up his plate and taking it into the kitchen. “He’s—“ Jun started to whisper when he left, but Nino stopped him.

“He’s like that with everyone, don’t worry about it.”

“Are you sure?”

“He’s an  _ artist _ ~” Nino explained, then shrugged. “I’ve seen his sketches anyway, they’re pretty good. And he’s always got clay or paint on his fingers.”

“He painted the bird,” Aiba murmured, slowly sliding down in his chair. Both Jun and Nino watched as his head slowly tipped to the side, eventually finding a spot on Jun’s shoulder. Nino rolled his eyes while Jun sighed.

Ohno came back then and snagged Aiba’s plate, then gave Nino a questioning look. Nino nodded, leaning back, and Ohno grabbed his too, then turned to Jun.

“Oh, that’s—I can get the dishes,” Jun started to move, but Ohno frowned and he froze.

“You cooked. The cook shouldn’t wash the dishes, that’s doing all the work.”

“I don’t mind, really, it’s—“ 

“No,” Ohno said flatly, and Nino coughed to hide his laugh at the frustrated look on Jun’s face.

“I guess that means I have to wash then,” he remarked, only to get hit with a scowl of his own.

“You cleaned the whole kitchen yesterday. I thought you just meant a bit or something, but even the fridge is clean.”

Nino eyed Ohno, debating if the grumpy look meant he should apologize.

“If I overstepped...” he started carefully. Truthfully, he’d been too worked up worrying to play his games, and Aiba had not been particularly helpful there. It had been clean or lose his mind staring at the wall.

“You keep doing that too,” Ohno complained, and Nino gave up. “Just—“ he made a frustrated sound. “Just sit there. You cooked, and you cleaned, and he’s asleep again so I’ll do the dishes and it’s fine!” He grabbed the last few dishes on the table and almost stomped from the room.

Nino slumped back in his seat unhappily, then gave Jun an annoyed look when he realized that Jun was trying to hide a grin.

“What?” he asked, but Jun just shrugged.

“I see now,” he said finally, then glanced down to Aiba. “Man, he’s out.” He shifted to bring his arm up and move some of Aiba’s hair out of his face. “Should we move him?”

“You can put him in his futon, second door on the right. Bathroom’s the first one if you need it.”

Jun nodded, getting a grip on Aiba before he stood. Aiba muttered something that didn’t sound like Karnian or Toracian, and Jun patted his head before starting to maneuver them down the hall.

Nino watched for a moment, envious of Jun’s height—he made half-carrying Aiba look easy, even if Aiba was still taller—then headed into the kitchen.

Ohno was at the sink, so Nino moved to him, resting his chin on Ohno’s shoulder and making sure to poke his elbows into Ohno’s back.

“Are you mad at me?” he asked once he was sure Ohno wasn’t going to shrug him off.

Ohno was quiet for a moment, and Nino slumped when he realized the other man was actually thinking about it.

“Sorry if I—“

“You keep apologizing,” Ohno said abruptly. “Well, Aiba-chan too, but I don’t know him so well…” He scrubbed at a rough spot on a plate.

“I’ll stop if you don’t want me too,” Nino said carefully, then winced when he felt Ohno tense beneath him.

“It’s that, too. Like, you’re walking on eggshells, being so careful with everything you say, and do.” Ohno grit his teeth for a second, then sighed. “I don’t know what you think is going to happen, but it won’t. It makes me feel so shitty, when you came here looking like crap with your sick friend and all your stuff on your back, then you apologize for breathing wrong like I’m gonna  _ do  _ something to you or kick you out or something…all your stuff...wait, where’s your guitar? You didn’t dump it, did you?”

He honestly looked upset at the thought, and Nino shook his head, a little alarmed.

“It’s at that record shop near the park on main. I helped the lady there with her arthritis, and she said she’d fix it up a bit for me. Dunno what, exactly, but I’m hoping for new strings at least…” he trailed off as Ohno relaxed.

Nino thought for another moment, then spoke again. “I think I get what you’re saying. Not like, entirely, but. I can see how you might feel like I don’t trust you. But I do. So, I’ll try not to...be so careful, I guess. But, in return then, I need you to understand something.” Ohno tilted his head, and Nino chewed his lip, trying to figure out how to explain without telling him too much.

“I...we’re used to getting the shit end of the deal. You wouldn’t be the first person to tell us there wouldn’t be a problem with us staying. And the times before, it usually didn’t take long for there to be a problem. We didn’t know most of them beforehand though, and that’s fair, I’m not saying you’re like them. But I hope you can understand why we’d be a bit cautious, especially when we only just met your roommate.”

“Sho-chan’s good,” Ohno insisted, though his voice had lost its previous edge. “Better than me.”

“Sure,” Nino agreed easily.

“...Okay,” Ohno said finally. “I’ll...I’ll try to remember that.”

“Thanks,” Nino said before he snuck a hand around to splash Ohno with water. He got an immediate potful of water on his head in return, and it took Jun coming back in looking exasperated at both of them to stop the ensuing water fight.

(In the end, all three of them had to clean up the kitchen.)


	4. Interlude: When J met N and A

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Flashback!
> 
> *cue cheesy music*

A few years earlier~~~

“Would you quit stalking me already?” Nino snapped, shooting a glare to a nearby clump of trees.

A boy stumbled out and Nino raised his eyebrows at the face, unmistakably Karnian. He wasn’t even wearing a mask, so Nino could see immediately how embarrassed he was, flushed red all the way to his hair.

“I’m um, Jun Matsumoto,” he managed when he came close enough. “Sorry, I wasn’t trying to—but that was rude, I’m sorry.” Nino had stood up as the boy got through his introduction, admittedly intrigued. That was a Karnian name too, but the boy’s accent was completely Toracian. 

“Nino,” he gave cautiously, but even the nickname had the boy, Jun, lighting up with some kind of emotion.

“I, sorry, I saw you last week, doing some, uh, magic? Magic tricks, I mean, with the cards.” Jun gestured vaguely, and Nino fingered the deck in his pocket. “You, I don’t know, maybe got something wrong? Or, or something, but you said, like,  _slevin_ .” Jun’s eyes darted around on the last word nervously, and Nino resisted the urge to check for himself if anyone was listening, focused on the boy in front of him and wondering if he was going to need to ditch his guitar and run. He hoped not, he probably wouldn’t be able to buy another one.

“You, uh, kinda reminded me of my sister? She used to say things like that and I…” Jun trailed off, and Nino frowned.

“Used to?” he asked bluntly.

Jun glanced away. “Maybe she still does. I get letters, sometimes. From my whole family, not just her. But they’re still in Karn, err, what used to be Karn.”

Nino did look around this time, then took a chance and switched to Karnian. “Why are you here then?” 

Jun’s eyes widened, but he responded in kind with only a slight stutter. He spoke fluently enough that he’d clearly studied, though his Toracian accent persisted. “When I was 5 or so, my adopted father...rescued me.”

“Stole you,” Nino surmised, and Jun pressed his lips together, but nodded. It wasn’t super common, but Nino had met others here and there, kids taken home as prizes by soldiers. Most had been abandoned after a year or two, to fend for themselves on the streets or try and make their own way back home. Nino supposed he and Aiba weren’t too different, when it came down to it.

“I’ve been allowed to keep in correspondence with my...former family, but my adopted father prefers that I not meet them again. He doesn’t want me to...regress.” Jun made a face on the last word, and Nino found himself copying it. He knew the type.

“So you got stolen by a pretty rich family then,” Nino presumed again, though that was pretty obvious from the clothes Jun was wearing, not quite in-season, but passably fashionable. Also telling was the rather formal Karnian he used, words Nino was pretty certain he’d only ever heard on TV.

Jun tilted his head in acquiescence. “My father, my  _ real _ father asked me to stay with my new family, and make a better life for myself here.”

“Guess that’s going pretty well for you,” Nino shrugged, half turning away and bending down to pick up his guitar.

Jun stayed silent for a long moment before quietly answering, “I miss my home.” The pure emotion in his voice made Nino freeze in place, and he groaned on the inside, knowing he was done for. He grimaced to himself, slowly fastening the clasps on the guitar case, then stood straight again with a sigh.

“Home probably isn’t like you remember,” he finally remarked, trying to sound like he wasn’t completely invested now. “It’s just the messed-up remnants of the war, with barely any scraps for the rich people, let alone the rest of us.”

“I know. But it’s not like this is home either.”

Nino rubbed his face with his hand, annoyed because Aiba had said nearly the exact same thing the day before while they’d been fighting. They’d gone to bed still on bad terms, and Aiba had left even before Nino this morning (Nino didn’t think he had had anywhere to go, he was just trying to avoid Nino).

He turned to face Jun and sighed. “You remember  _ ressen _ ?”

Jun blinked at him, then perked up. “Yeah, a bit. I haven’t had it since then though.”

“Of course not,” Nino snorted. “No one here knows about it. You chip in some cash, I’ll show you how to make it.” He picked up his guitar and started off without waiting for a reply.

“Really? Why?” Jun followed him immediately, and Nino shrugged.

“Because if I make it for you, that means I don’t have to make it for my roommate.”

“Is he Karnian too?”

“Yeah.”

“Why can’t he have any?”

“Of course he’s gonna have some, that’s not what I said.”

Jun paused, though his feet kept pace with Nino’s.

“What, are you shy or something?”

“What? No! We just had a fight yesterday that was...well, not entirely his fault. So.”

“So you want to say sorry without saying sorry. Isn’t that kind of cheating?”

“I can still change my mind you know.” Nino was starting to realize that Jun was not as willing to put up with his bullshit as Aiba was, but at the same time he knew it was already too late.

“Okay, okay, you’re just making it for me then. Thanks.”

  
  


Jun had willingly pulled out his wallet to help pay for the ingredients (Nino had winced a bit to see how few bills were in there though, realizing that Jun was probably on a pretty strict allowance) then when they’d gotten back to the apartment, he’d watched with sharp eyes as Nino had shown him how to make the dumplings.

Now, a few minutes later, Jun was making them mostly by himself, apparently happy to take over. Nino took the chance to put the rest of the groceries away and secretly tried to tidy up a bit. A guest was a guest, after all. He left Jun alone in the kitchen when he heard Aiba finally tromping his way up the stairs. 

Aiba frowned to see him in the entryway when he came in, then looked away like that would hide his black eye and broken nose, toeing off his shoes and hanging up his jacket.

“All that time we spent yelling yesterday, and you don’t even wait a day to go join the fights again? ” Nino asked, temporarily forgetting about Jun in the face of his annoyance.

“Someone called in sick. Now he owes me a favor, and I got paid extra,” Aiba muttered in a particularly sulky tone. “It’s a win-win.”

“Your face would disagree,” Nino couldn’t help snapping back.

“What’s it to you? You said you wouldn’t fix any more ‘reckless stupidity’ so don’t worry about it.”

Nino ground his teeth to hear Aiba throwing his words back at him. “I was hoping you would, you know,  _ stop. _ ”

“If I had a choice—”

“Nino, do you think it would taste better—”

All three of them jumped when Jun came out of the kitchen, Nino inwardly cursing himself for getting distracted with this stupid fight again.

He turned back towards Jun, feeling Aiba come up closer behind him, getting Nino’s shirt in his grip. 

“Calm down,” he hissed at him, and after a nervous glance, Aiba let him go.

He opened his mouth to say something (sorry Jun this is my roommate, he’s a bit of a mess—sorry Aiba, didn’t mean to freak you out, my bad) but Jun beat him to it.

“You’re Nino’s roommate? Oh, but your eye—do you have an ice pack, I can grab it—“ he turned back to the kitchen, but Nino stopped him.

“Don’t bother,” he said, ignoring the confused look on Jun’s face when he turned back. He shifted to grab Aiba’s chin. Aiba startled, but knew what Nino was doing and didn’t pull away. He kept still as Nino mended his eye and nose (and fractured cheek bone,  _ ouch _ ) and waited until Nino pulled away before he stepped back.

Jun was watching them with wide eyes, and he suddenly moved forward, leaning in close to Aiba’s face to peer at him.

“Wow, you’re a healer?” Jun practically squeaked. His hand came up to (gently) run over Aiba’s cheekbone, and Nino raised his eyebrows, but had to grin at the panicked look Aiba was shooting him. “I want to study magic at the university when I graduate high school—though the exam’s really hard, I don’t know if I’ll pass—and—“

“Um, can I just—“ Aiba managed before he moved away from Jun’s hand and ducked behind Nino.

Jun, red-faced again, ducked his head in apology. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to—I just, I’ve never seen a healer before, and I’ve always wondered about the process—um, but, sorry.”

“Rich family like yours, you’ve never seen a healer? Are they that expensive?” Nino asked, surprised. He ignored the way Aiba was shifting awkwardly behind him—he probably just had to pee or something.

“Ah, um, well, my brothers, sometimes, but I was never there at the time, and, um, I never…got hurt, or...anything, so...” Jun trailed off on that obvious lie, eyes focused on the floor, and Nino pressed his lips together tightly.

“Really, never?” Aiba asked behind him, and Nino smacked him. “Ouch, what? I just—“ 

“Be quiet if you’re just going to say stupid things!” Nino hissed at him. He ignored Aiba’s muttered complaints to address Jun again.

“Well yes, I’m technically a healer, but I don’t have a license. If I did we definitely wouldn’t be living here.” Nino gestured to their tiny apartment with one hand.

“Are you sure about that Nino, you’re pretty cheap—ow, stop that!”

“This is Aiba, he says dumb things sometimes, sorry about that. Aiba-chan, this is MatsuJun. He’s a cute kid.”

Jun furrowed his brows at the nickname, then scowled. “I’m 15, I’m not  _ cute _ .”

“You’re definitely cute,” Nino informed him, though he was cringing inside to hear how old Jun was.  _ Please don’t let Aiba have heard _ , he prayed but—

“15? Wow, that’s the same as Nino! He’s a cute kid too, don’t worry, ow, yes yes, ow, okay, sorry.”

“You’re barely 6 months older, don’t push it,” Nino informed him, still pinching Aiba’s arm.

“Does someone else live here?” Jun asked, looking around.

“Does it look like someone else could fit?” Nino asked with a snort, finally letting go.

“Oh, no, it’s just, I thought you had to be 18 to live alone.” Aiba stilled behind Nino, but Nino kept his voice calm.

“You do. Planning on reporting us?” He was still relieved when Jun shook his head.

“No, I just...I want to leave my parent’s place as soon as possible, so if there was a way...but okay, sorry.”

There was quiet for a moment, then Jun coughed. “Anyway, about the  _ ressen _ —“

“ _ Ressen _ ? You’re making  _ ressen? _ ” Aiba flat-out switched to Karnian at that, and only realized afterward, clapping a hand over his mouth.

“You’re an idiot,” Nino told him idly, but he said it in the same language, and Aiba relaxed, then more when Jun had nodded.

“Nino was showing me how to make it,” he replied, speaking his formal Karnian, and Aiba’s eyebrows furrowed, before he exclaimed with glee,

“You sound so fancy, what is that?”

“It’s Karnian,” Jun frowned, giving Nino a confused look.

“It’s rich-people Karnian,” Nino informed him, and Jun flushed.

“Sorry, I’ll try not to—“

“No no no, don’t worry about it! It’s cute!” Aiba looked excited now, then his face abruptly dropped. “Wait, wait, I’ve gotta pee first, don’t start without me!” He darted off down the hall, tossing his bag in the main room.

Jun and Nino watched him go, then Jun turned back to Nino. 

“You had a fight with  _ him _ ?” He sounded perplexed. Nino scratched his head, then sighed.

“It’s complicated,” he muttered finally. Jun looked at him for another moment, then shrugged.

“Anyway, about the  _ ressen _ , I think if you added some different seasonings to the meat, you could get some interesting flavors.”

“My grandmother is rolling over in her grave right now,” Nino informed him. “And I don’t even know if she’s actually dead, so that’s even more impressive.”

“Oh, we don’t have to, I just thought…”

“Eh, do what you want. Wait for Aiba-chan though, he’ll want to experiment. Don’t let him put the mapo in.”

“I...what? No, of course not, that’s—“

“I promise you, he’s going to try.”

  
  


The  _ ressen  _ ended up being a huge success (minus the mapo ones), and Nino secretly took a few photos on his phone of the other two, giggling and stuffing their faces with dumplings. He tried to send some of the snacks home with Jun, but the other boy gave him a bitter smile and shook his head, and Nino didn’t push it. They exchanged numbers though, and Nino was surprised how much cheerier his contacts list looked with more than just Aiba and his work saved there.

When he eventually reached a place in his game where he could pause for the night, he sighed and clicked it shut. This easy, relaxed feeling was so much better than last night, when his stomach had been in knots over the sharp words he’d exchanged with Aiba.

The other boy looked up when Nino put his game down, then closed his book and stretched. Aiba made it a point to study Toracian each night, as long as Nino was gaming. He’d ask Nino how to read words sometimes, or try and quiz him on vocabulary. Nino always got them right, unless Aiba messed up the question.

Tonight Aiba hadn’t spoken at all though, and as they turned out the light and got into their futons, Nino was struck by a sudden anxious worry, that maybe Aiba was still annoyed about last night after all. He tried to shut the voice in his head up, but it only got louder until Nino finally gave up, throwing the covers back off.

The voice screeched at him, warning that if he pushed too hard, Aiba would hate him and leave. But really, Nino told it, this would be such a stupid thing for Aiba to randomly draw the line on. Satisfied with that, he wiggled into Aiba’s futon with him, grinning triumphantly when Aiba only shook with laughter.

“Whaaat?” Aiba groaned finally, scooting back so Nino had more room. Nino ignored that, taking advantage of the night and the fact that they wouldn’t talk about this tomorrow to wrap himself around Aiba. Contrary to what the voice had whispered, Aiba only shifted to get more comfortable before idly patting his head. “What’s up Nino?” he yawned.

“Are you still mad at me?” Nino asked Aiba’s collarbone. 

“Why was I mad at you? For hitting me?”

“No, yesterday.”

“Oh...weren’t you the one who was mad yesterday?”

“Yeah, but...you left. This morning, I mean. You were mad.” Waking up with an empty futon next to him and Aiba’s bag gone hadn’t been a fun experience. 

Aiba sighed and squeezed him tight for a minute. “I just...didn’t have anything to say to you. I know you’re right, but I can’t change anything so I don’t know what to say or to do, or…”

“I know. I hate that you go there and get hurt like it’s nothing, is all. And I hate how they treat you like shit.”

“Well, I’m the ‘Karnian scum’ after all. It’s my job to win a few then ultimately lose to the ‘heroic Toracian.’” Nino felt Aiba shrug. “At least I can pretend it’s an act.”

“They’re the scum,” Nino hissed. “They’re the ones who go home and teach their kids how to be scum just like them. Or pretend to be the savior, taking some kid from his family and acting like it’s for his own good.”

Quiet for a moment, then, “You mean MatsuJun.”

Nino nodded, and Aiba continued, “When he said he never gets hurt—“

“He meant they don’t take him to a healer even if he does, even if they would for their other kids.”

“Oh…” a small, sad sound from Aiba. “That’s so...mean.”

“He’d have been better off where he was,” Nino muttered, then froze.

A careful hand stroked his hair, and Nino closed his eyes in guilt.

“Do you...feel that way?” he asked finally, pretty sure he didn’t want to know the answer. Aiba was quiet for what felt like ages, and Nino couldn’t do anything but wait, shaking. The point had been to escape, to get somewhere safe, somewhere better, but it occurred to Nino that the worst parts of Aiba’s life back there had to do with Nino, and maybe if Nino hadn’t selfishly dragged him along, maybe Aiba would have been doing pretty good right now.

“Back there,” Aiba spoke finally, “things were comfortable. I knew my place, knew what my job was, and the people around me mostly liked me, for  _ me _ . I don’t have any of those things here. No place, no job, and people hate me for the way I look, before they even know my name, much less  _ me _ .” 

Nino made himself keep breathing, because that was all he could do at the moment. 

“But...it was all very fragile, too. He could destroy it whenever he wanted. Some of the people out there with me hated you, cause you got to be inside, and wear nicer clothes and have lots of free time. They would talk about how sorry they felt for me, when they thought I couldn’t hear, cause I was the one who got in trouble when you were, ‘being lazy’, is what they said. But they didn’t get it, they didn’t care. Or maybe they just wanted to think that inside was better somehow. But you had to be in there with him all the time, while we were mostly free to do whatever outside, as long as we got the job done.” 

Nino heard an odd note in Aiba’s voice, and carefully reached up, wiping a couple tears off his cheeks.

“When you said we should run, I said yes so I could get you away from him. That was all that mattered, so I don’t regret it.”

“If I had gone without you…” Nino offered quietly, but Aiba shook his head.

“I would have hated that. And I don’t think you would have made it.”

Nino wanted to protest, but he still remembered that night, rain pouring down as the ground beneath them surged, Aiba’s magic lighting up the whole river bank a brilliant green as he’d heaved a couple tons worth of earth to keep them safe from pursuit.

“I wouldn’t have made it by myself either, but still. Plus, if you had made it anyway, he probably would have killed me.”

Aiba said it pretty matter-of-factly, but Nino’s stomach twisted at the statement. He’d been caught up in his own guilt trip about it, and had assumed that life would have just gone on without him there. But Aiba was probably right. 

“So we just switched places then,” Nino said finally, annoyed at how thick his voice sounded. “Now it’s you inside and me outside.”

Aiba shrugged. “Maybe. But with him there, that was never going to be anything other than hell for you. Here though, if I can find someone to give me a chance…” his voice trailed off in uncertainty, and Nino knew that was a big if.

“I’m sorry,” he told Aiba’s collarbone.

“I’ll try harder,” Aiba whispered, and though it made Nino’s heart hurt, it was the last thing either of them said that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ty :)


	5. Ch 3: An Uneasy Meal for Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has definitely been a few weeks huh? Let’s hope the next few calm down a bit...

Jun leaned against the building, left arm cradled carefully to his chest while he scrolled through apps on his phone with his right. It was getting late, and he was wondering if he’d made a mistake. If Nino hadn’t gone to work today, or if he’d come home early...Maybe he should message him after all? 

Ugh. He shifted and fought back a wince as his arm twinged painfully. At this point Nino was definitely going to give him shit, regardless. He might as well wait a little more.

A couple walked by, looking back over their shoulders at him after they’d passed, and he hoped they weren’t going to call the cops on him. That wouldn’t end well.

Where was Nino though, seriously. Jun was having flashbacks to last week, except this time he knew they couldn’t possibly have been kicked out of their apartment. Well...it seemed really unlikely anyway.

But Nino never went out after work, always left right on the dot and came home and played video games unless Aiba or Jun dragged him into doing something. And Jun knew Aiba was fine, because he’d just gotten a video of a giraffe with its head stuck in a tree branch from his friend, along with a laughing emoji.

If it had been their old place, Jun would have just gone up to check for himself, but it wasn’t, and his arm hurt, and Nino wasn’t anywhere to be seen and—

“MatsuJun?” A voice from behind him made him jump, and he had to clench his teeth this time as pain radiated throughout his body. He collected himself, then turned around to see one Sho Sakurai. Shit.

“Sakurai-kun, hi, didn’t expect to see you here,” he managed.

Sho gave him a polite smile, though it still seemed like he was frowning somehow. “I actually live in this building,” he said, and Jun raised his eyebrows in disbelief at the coincidence.

“Oh, really? My friends live here, I was waiting for one of them.” Kinda true, kinda not, but Jun couldn’t help feeling like he was lying to Sho. Ugh, this was the worst.

“Oh, that’s interesting. I haven’t seen you around before—MatsuJun?”

_ Shitshitshit_, Jun couldn’t help thinking to himself. He’d felt his heart rate speed up as Sho had talked, and he knew Sho had to be able to feel him panicking.  _ Always the empaths, _ he thought, then grimaced as he realized he was quoting his adopted father.

“Yes, sorry?” He tried, but it hadn’t worked back in high school when Sho had tutored him, and it definitely wasn’t working now. Sho had an eyebrow raised and everything.

“Is something wrong? You seem to be a bit upset…”

Jun snorted despite himself. “Seem to be? Is that all?”

Sho gave an exasperated sigh. “Most people prefer to pretend I can’t tell how they’re feeling.”

“I don’t need you to lie to me,” Jun snapped back.

“Fine then. You’re halfway to freaking out, and I’m making it worse, which...do you want me to call someone? Who’s your friend?”

“No, it’s fine. There’s no one.” Jun shifted to start walking away, then nearly jumped out of his skin to see Ohno coming from the other direction. Wait, maybe this was good. “Actually, there’s one now, um, so everything’s fine, you don’t need to—“

Sho followed his gaze and frowned. “Ohno-kun?” 

What was happening today, Jun wondered idly. What useless star had screwed him over so royally—

“Yes, um, he lives here, and—“

“I know, he’s my roommate.”

“What.” Jun couldn’t tell if this was good or bad. He hadn’t seen Sho in the apartment when he’d been there last week, and he hadn’t heard anyone mention him. He had no idea what Sho knew about Nino and Aiba, or what was okay to say.

“You’re friends with Ohno?” Sho was giving him a skeptical look now, and Jun shrugged with one shoulder.

“We’ve met,” he said finally.

Sho glanced between him and Ohno for a moment, then his face cleared up. “I see. You’re friends with Nino and Aiba.”

“Well...yeah,” Jun muttered, starting to think this had all been pointless.

“Sho-chan,” Ohno had reached them. “You know MatsuJun?” Jun was kind of touched that he remembered his nickname.

“Yeah, I used to tutor him when he was in high school.”

“You were in high school too,” Jun grumbled.

“For some of it,” Sho corrected, and Jun rolled his eyes.

“He made us dinner while you were sleeping,” Ohno added, scratching at his nose.

“Oh man, I can’t believe I missed it! I love MatsuJun’s cooking!” Sho complained, and Jun huffed, starting to relax a bit. Then Sho put a hand on his shoulder, and Jun froze, his arm going white-hot with pain. It took everything he had not to make a sound, but it didn’t matter.

Sho pulled back immediately, and even Ohno was giving him a funny look.

“Your face just went really white,” he told Jun, who shakily tried to grin.

“It’s nothing,” he tried, but Sho was scowling at him.

“You’re hurt! I knew there was something wrong!”

“Everything’s fine, I was just upset about something,” Jun insisted, edging back.

“I know what I’m talking about,” Sho snapped back.

“You’re an empath, you can’t feel physical pain like that!”

“People have emotions when they get hurt! You’re distressed and panicky, you’ve been trying to hide something this whole time—“ Sho looked briefly triumphant at having solved the mystery before he frowned again. “We can get you to the hospital, I’ll pay whatever your insurance won’t cover, it’s fine.”

“No, I’m not going there,” Jun shook his head and Sho frowned, exchanging a glance with Ohno.

“You’re waiting for Nino?” Ohno asked suddenly, and Jun gave a short nod before looking away.

“Nino’s not a licensed healer—“ Sho apparently knew that much, anyway. “—I mean, he seems like he knows what he’s doing, but it’s probably better to—“

“If I go there, they’ll ask me questions,” Jun snapped, “and I don’t want to deal with them.”

“If you think Nino’s just going to fix it no questions asked, then I think you’re underestimating him. And what kind of questions are you worried about?” Sho was looking frustrated now, but Jun just shook his head.

There was a tense silence for a moment before Ohno suddenly spoke up, startling the other two.

“Nino’s picking up his guitar, so he’ll be a bit longer. Let’s wait for him upstairs.” Sho’s mouth twisted unhappily, and Ohno added, “If he says MatsuJun needs to go to the hospital, we can take him. Nino won’t lie if he thinks he can’t help.”

Sho still looked a little frustrated, but he finally nodded, and Jun couldn’t do much else but agree. He watched as Ohno typed the code, then allowed Sho to carefully maneuver them both to keep Jun’s injured arm away from the wall or bumping into other people. Sho had always been kind, he couldn’t help thinking, always trying to see things from Jun’s point of view, and listening when he talked. A rarity among Jun’s tutors, and he’d appreciated it on some level, though part of him had wanted nothing to do with anyone his adopted father had hired for him.

By the time they got to the apartment, Jun’s defensive anger had faded, and his arm was throbbing in its place. After the long morning and afternoon had ended with a painful reminder of how his father felt about him, the bright, cheery clay figures decorating the entranceway made something swell in his chest. It got worse as Ohno helped him get his shoes off, then even more when he turned the corner to the living room and found Aiba already there wearing pajama pants and a T-shirt with a towel around his neck.

“Um,” he started, but his voice was raspy and he stopped again.

“MatsuJun, hi! Oh—oh no, what’s wrong, what happened?”

Jun scrubbed at the tears that had snuck onto his cheeks with his good hand, then waved it around in the air helplessly before covering his face again. He didn’t resist when Aiba pulled him to sit on the couch.

“His arm’s hurt, the left one. Nino says he’ll be here in about 5 more minutes,” Sho explained somewhere above his head. Jun felt Aiba nod, and switch sides so he was sitting on Jun’s right. A careful arm snuck around his side, and Jun didn’t protest, even when it pulled him a little closer to Aiba’s side. Aiba was warm, and smelled nice, and when he started rambling on about the giraffe, Jun managed to uncover his face.

He was watching another video on Aiba’s phone, this one with a kangaroo kicking Aiba, when Nino got home.

“He’s a sweet—well, kind of, I guess—guy, but I think he thinks I’m his toy? Which doesn’t seem good but everyone else thinks it’s funny so I don’t know—oh, hi Nino.”

Jun glanced up for the first time to see Nino walking into the room, work bag on his shoulder and guitar case in his hand. He hadn’t even taken his mask off yet, but he set his stuff against the wall and plopped on the floor in front of Jun. Sho and Ohno had mostly been staying away, though Ohno had brought Jun a glass of water earlier. They were sitting at the kitchen table now, probably not quite within hearing range, but close enough to keep an eye out, at least in Sho’s case.

“Lemme see,” Nino said, his voice quiet, maybe a little tired. When Jun shifted to comply, he and Aiba both helped him get his jacket off. His arm wasn’t as swollen as it had been before, but it still looked bad enough that Aiba hissed in sympathy.

“Broken,” Nino murmured, a thumb carefully resting just below the break. “Guessing it wasn’t from studying too hard?”

“I went home,” Jun admitted, and Nino met his eyes for a moment, then looked back down at his arm, letting Aiba handle it.

“It’s spring break, right? We’ve had a lot of college kids visiting this week. But weren’t you gonna stay at the dorms?” Aiba managed to make it sound like a normal question, somehow.

“Mom asked me to come home to help with the little ones,” Jun explained, watching as Nino unwrapped the ice pack that had melted a few hours ago. “She gave me that,” he added, a little helplessly. Nino glanced down at it, then impassively put it on the table.

Jun sniffed, leaning into Aiba a little bit more. Aiba took it for the permission it was, carefully wrapping himself around Jun. “She, she doesn’t like it when he does this,” he tried as Nino started examining his arm and checking for any other breaks.

“She doesn’t stop him either,” Aiba said quietly. 

“You said before, the one time he raised a hand to one of your brothers, she slapped him so hard he got a bruise.” Nino’s voice was matter-of-fact, as if he was talking about the weather.

Jun didn’t reply. He didn’t really know what to say. If it were only his piece of shit adopted father at the house, he’d never go back. But his mom, his adopted mom had always been, well, somewhat kind. To a kid stolen from his homeland, it had been enough, even if his brothers (her real children) always got more than him, better than him. But more and more as he got older, he was starting to realize how convenient he was for her, her only son who would always come running when she called, eager to please. Never mind how her husband would raise a fist at him even out of boredom.

“MatsuJun,” Nino said. Jun looked up at him, then swore loudly in pain as Nino took the opportunity to set the bone.

“Jackass,” he hissed, but Nino just stuck out his tongue. Jun noticed Sho and Ohno peering at them, but didn’t have a chance to say anything before heat rushed through his arm, leaving him dizzy for a moment before it all faded—the heat, the pain, the swelling. All gone. He carefully flexed his fingers, slumping in relief to find his arm working perfectly as it had been this morning. “Thank you,” he added, and felt Aiba giggling quietly behind him.

“That’s quite impressive for someone without a license,” Sho remarked, he and Ohno standing closer to the sofa now. There was a sharp note in his voice that Ohno apparently missed, as he simply nodded and clapped softly. 

“True,” Nino stretched languidly, “maybe I should get one then.”

Jun shifted uncomfortably, feeling the strange tension in the room. Sho was hard to keep secrets around—he almost always knew when he was being lied to, and was sharp enough to notice what facts weren’t adding up. 

But Nino was Nino, still hard for Jun to read even after knowing him these past few years. He couldn’t tell if Aiba was any better at it—half the time Aiba just seemed to assume, and Nino let him be right. Or maybe that was Jun putting too much thought into it.

Regardless, Sho didn’t push the issue, instead looking to Jun.

“If you don’t need to visit the hospital, then stay for dinner. We’ll order something.”

Jun shrugged, glancing over to Aiba and Nino before nodding. 

  
  


Dinner was a bit awkward as Sho was clearly dying to ask multiple questions that Jun didn’t want to answer, while no one else seemed particularly in the mood to chat—Nino still looked tired, and Ohno was potentially sleep-eating. So Sho ended up leading most of the conversation—careful, light questions only, but his gaze was heavy on Jun. Aiba was making something of an effort to participate as well, probably to make up for Nino and Jun’s half-answers, but he kept faltering every time Sho met his gaze. 

“So you’ve known Jun since you were, what, 15 or so? How did you meet him?” Sho asked curiously, and Jun watched as Aiba fidgeted in his seat before answering.

“Nino brought him home? Uh...yeah, and we ate—food. Um.”

“You two lived together then too? With your parents?” Sho looked at Aiba briefly as he asked, but he was more focused on cutting his meat. Jun winced at the question though, and shifted uncomfortably when he felt Aiba twitch. Sho’s gaze jumped back up to Aiba almost immediately, likely sensing the other’s panic, and Jun quickly elbowed Nino on his other side.

Nino jerked from where he looked to have been zoning out on his salad.

“Uh, we, um…” Aiba started, and Nino frowned, tilting his head before shrugging.

“Our parents are still in Karn,” he said briskly, grabbing his chopsticks. “Well, as far as we know, anyway. We stayed with some other refugees for a while, then moved out when we were old enough.” He took a bite of the salad as he side-eyed Aiba, who ducked his head.

“Oh, sorry,” Sho murmured. 

“But I thought—“ Ohno suddenly spoke up, giving Nino a confused look.

“What?” Nino sounded bored now, but Jun knew he had to be tense.

There was a long pause as Ohno frowned down at the table. “Never mind,” he said finally.

“I used to go over and practice Karnian with them,” Jun spoke finally, hoping to get away from the subject. “And Aiba would laugh at me cause I sounded like a rich boy. I learned a lot of those words from you, by the way.”

Sho spluttered. “I  _ told _ you that what you were learning in class was a very specific dialect—“

“So when I asked you how to say things—“

“I thought you were asking for a class essay or something!” Sho was starting to get indignant, but beside him Ohno was laughing quietly, so Jun pushed a little harder.

“What kind of essay would I be writing about how to find moles?”

“What kind of conversations were you having?” Sho shot back, and Aiba giggled.

“I forgot about that,” Nino muttered.

“We were looking for them,” Aiba said between giggles. “It was...we were trying to help the people we were staying with. They had a mole problem.”

“I don’t think we helped much,” Jun added. “Aiba fell in a few holes though.”

“Nino pushed me!” Aiba protested, and Nino rolled his eyes. 

“I definitely didn’t. You just couldn’t accept that the moles had outsmarted you.”

Aiba made a defeated noise that actually got Sho laughing, and somehow or another they managed to finish dinner without any incidents.

Afterwards, Jun flopped next to Nino on his futon. He’d ended up deciding to stay the night since he didn’t have class tomorrow and Nino said he had a late shift.

“Sho went and got out another futon for you,” Nino grumbled into his pillow. “Get off mine and let me sleep.”

“What are you guys going to do?” Jun asked quietly, ignoring his complaint.

Next to them, Aiba stilled, giving Jun his attention.

“Why do you ask me that like you think I have an answer?” Nino sounded annoyed, but he shifted enough to look up at Jun.

“You know Sho’s an empath, right? If you’re going to be here much longer, you’re going to have to tell him something. He can tell when you’re lying.”

“Only if I get emotional about it,” Nino sounded confident, but Jun gave him a skeptical look before turning to Aiba. Nino followed his gaze and sighed as Aiba went red.

“Well excuse me for being an honest person,” Aiba grumbled, “sorry to ruin your lying,” he added before turning his back on them. Jun waited a beat, before rolling to his futon and turning him back over. He made a face at Jun, but didn’t pull away.

“Well, you know the guy best,” Nino continued. “What’s he gonna do if we tell him? How straight-laced is he?”

Jun winced. “He’s pretty by-the-book. But...I dunno. I always thought he was a good guy. I mean, my— _that_ guy hired him, so I didn’t want to like him, but he was nice.”

__

__

There was quiet for a moment before Nino finally asked, “Did he know?”

__

__

“Know what?” Jun deflected, then frowned as one of Aiba’s hands came up to gently take his hand, the other tracing down to where the broken bone had been a few hours ago.

__

__

He didn’t answer immediately, thinking back to high school. With his brothers out of the house more, his time alone with his parents had increased, and his injuries along with them. Generally Jun had taken the hits and kept going, but broken bones had been hard to ignore. He remembered putting a brace on a wrist that he’d hoped was only sprained, only to nearly pass out when Aiba had bumped it. Aiba had yelled for Nino between sobs, convinced that he’d been the one to hurt Jun somehow. 

__

__

( _“Of course it wasn’t you stupid, he’s already wearing a brace. You should have been paying more attention though…Hey, MatsuJun!” and the world went white for a second before suddenly snapping back into place, his wrist in perfect condition.) _

__

__

They hadn’t believed him when he finally managed to stammer that he’d fallen, but they’d let him lie, Nino finally just telling him to come by right away next time he “hurt himself”.

__

__

“I don’t know,” he finally admitted. “I think he suspected something. He asked me questions sometimes, and I would lie, and he would know I was lying…” Nino sighed softly next to him, and Jun frowned.

__

__

“He was in the same grade as one of my brothers though, and I think he talked to him. They started letting me hang out with them after school, telling  _ him  _ that I was studying with them. Sho stopped coming a bit after that, I never really heard why.”

__

__

He fidgeted with the corner of Aiba’s pillow, then shot a look at Nino.

__

__

“What did Ohno almost catch you on at dinner by the way?”

__

__

Nino made a face and rubbed his cheeks with his hands. “I think I told him before, that it’s just been me and this guy for a while now.” He made a vague gesture in Aiba’s direction. “I didn’t realize the bum painting in the park would remember something like that, much less interpret it correctly.”

__

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Aiba huffed and crossed his arms.

__

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“Oh-chan is not the problem,” Nino continued, sounding a little annoyed. “His potential snitch of a roommate is the problem—“

__

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“You’re mean when you’re tired,” Aiba told him, and Nino snorted.

__

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“Then let me sleep,” he complained, and Aiba and Jun both snickered.

__

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“Okay, okay,” Aiba conceded, and sat up so he could pull Jun (who yelped) to his own futon, squeezed in on Aiba’s other side.

__

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“Night,” Aiba said as he hit the remote for the light, and Jun and Nino both hissed complaints until he turned it back on, giving them a chance to plug in various phones to charge. “Oh, mine too,” Aiba realized, pulling out the phone Jun had helped him get the weekend before. Jun gave him an exasperated look before hitting the light himself this time, and pulling the blanket up around himself to sleep.

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	6. A Confrontation with an Audience

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I could write things in order, this would have been up weeks ago lmao. Unfortunately I spent my time writing scenes from bajillions of chaps in the future. 
> 
> Happy New Year everyone, let’s all get through this together :))) ;__; :)))

For all that this apartment had just been his and Sho’s for the past couple years, Ohno very quickly got used to having two extra people in it. Neither Nino nor Aiba was particularly obtrusive, and chores divided up amongst four people made a lot less work than there had been before. 

On the days where he worked at the bakery, he usually got home pretty late (around the same time as Sho). Before, they had both grabbed something at the convenience store and eaten together at the kitchen table. Now, Nino usually would cook something on those days—simple, but satisfying, and all Ohno had to do was wash the dishes (he insisted).

Other days Jun would bring something when he came over, and Ohno sometimes even worked up the initiative to cook something on his days off. 

Nino was the same as ever, though Ohno was secretly pleased that he and Sho seemed to have hit it off pretty well. Sho liked to talk about things in the paper over dinner, and while Ohno generally didn’t have any clue about most of them, Sho was usually satisfied with his vaguely interested grunts. The delighted look on his face when Nino had actually responded one evening had made Ohno snort into his soup.

After the first week or so, Aiba had started to participate as well, mostly asking questions. He seemed to be on a similar page to Ohno (a very blank one) and Ohno was grateful for his efforts to understand since they helped him too. 

For Nino’s part, he seemed to like Sho, and (as far as Ohno could tell) was doing his best to see how many times he could get Sho to make a genuinely confused noise. It was a cute sound, and Nino would cover his grin with a hand every time he drove Sho to that point. When Jun was there, the conversations were even louder, and the words would get longer, but Aiba was much more likely to jump in and get everything sidetracked with a random question on those nights. Those dinners were fun.

Sho had asked Ohno a few nights ago if he was comfortable with them living here, and maybe even continuing to live here in the future. Ohno had shrugged. Nino was Nino, still making idle strange commentary on Ohno’s art, and needling him for attention, but always knowing just when to back off, leaving Ohno fondly exasperated. 

Aiba still seemed like a deer in headlights sometimes, but Ohno was starting to find that endearing. And Ohno kept catching him staring in blatant fascination at his sketchbook, or at his paintings. 

Sho swore up and down that he hadn’t done anything to make the art gallery accept his work for an exhibition, but Ohno hadn’t really believed him. Sure, Nino said nice things too (in weird, rude ways) but Nino was similar to Sho in a polished, say-what-people-want-to-hear way, and Ohno couldn’t be sure how true his words were. But Ohno had come home to Aiba flat-out sitting on the floor in front of his ocean painting, just staring at it. He’d jumped up with a stammered apology when he’d seen Ohno there, and quickly vanished into his room, but the image of him just sitting there in the fading sunlight had stuck with Ohno. He’d even made a sketch of it, though he wasn’t sure if he should make it a painting without asking first. Saying he liked Aiba because he (seemed to) like Ohno’s artwork sounded a bit self-absorbed, but Ohno couldn’t help but feel moved by someone who would just sit down and gaze at a painting like that.

Jun also seemed to be a bonus that came with the other two—a bonus that cooked well, but also tended to put Sho on the defensive. Ohno wasn’t quite clear on their relationship, but Sho at least usually seemed happy enough to see him. As long as Sho was okay with him, Ohno didn’t mind.

He’d told Sho as much, though in much fewer words, and Sho had nodded thoughtfully. “I think I need to have a talk with Aiba-chan first,” the other man had said finally. “Nino’s too...slippery.” That described Nino well enough, Ohno had thought.

Tonight, he’d had supper alone, with texts from the others mentioning late work. Nino was apparently staying at the clinic overnight, keeping an eye on a patient in a delicate state. Ohno had enjoyed taking his time in the bath, a bit of a luxury recently, then settled down in his studio, getting out his fans to polish.

The windows in his studio were open, a nice breeze helping to carry away some of the pungent odor of the polish as the sounds of the night surrounded him. Sho had received some candles as a souvenir from a colleague who had visited northern Toracia recently, and he in turn had gifted them to Ohno. They smelled like home, and he thought it was fitting to burn one while he worked, rather than use the overhead lights.

The fans themselves were metal, and folded out to show the local deities of his village, painstakingly painted into the designs that had been etched into the metal. Ohno didn’t know who had done it, some craftsman in his village perhaps. They were a traditional gift for those who practiced the craft (with or without air magic) and Ohno had known they were to be his on his 13th birthday. He hadn’t felt like waiting though, taking them out of their ceremonial box to inspect the artwork months ahead of time.

A bit giddy with their beauty, even if he thought the deities were a little silly (the swan was pretty enough, but 12 year-old Ohno hadn’t quite been able to appreciate the turtle), he’d taken them out to practice in the woods a distance from the village. 

That little act of rebellion had saved his life, getting him away from a village doomed to destruction at the hands of an indifferent army. At the same time, it had left him homeless and hopeless. 

It had taken a long time after for him to be able to even look at the fans without getting sick to his stomach. He’d only really been able to care for them properly after moving in with Sho, and the fans unfortunately showed that neglect still, some of the damage irreparable. A perfect match for him, he couldn’t help but think with a rueful smile.

Ohno knew he had to have been reminiscing for a while when he heard the balcony doors opening, and saw two shadows sit down, their owners just out of view and commenting on the nice weather.

Maybe he should join them, he surprised himself by thinking, and even more when he actually got up to do it, putting his fans back into their case. (He never went out without them, but usually put them in the case overnight)

He’d just started to head for the door when he heard Sho speak up in a more serious tone.

“There’s something I’ve been wanting to talk to you about.”

Ah. Right. Sho had said something about talking to Aiba-chan. Ohno grabbed his pencil and sketchbook instead, curling up on the cheap couch he had in the room (he slept on it quite often, actually).

Aiba sounded a bit flustered as he answered, “Oh, um, if this is about the cat hair everywhere, I’m really sorry. There’s this new leopard, and she’s really affectionate and—“

“I know that Nino doesn’t have any identification,” Sho interrupted, and Ohno blinked in surprise, lifting his eyes from his sketchbook and hearing Aiba take a quick breath. “He’s an amazingly skilled healer, but he can’t get a license because he entered the country illegally, right? And that’s one reason why you two were living in a place that could just kick you out like that. And why both of you feel like you’re hiding something.”

Aiba was silent for a long moment, and it gave Ohno a chance to think back on his own, how Nino never went to look for a new apartment without Aiba, and how he always wore a mask when he went out. There may have been other reasons for that, but wanting to stay out of any trouble was probably a big one. He tapped his pencil on the paper, unsettled by this new information about someone he thought he’d known quite well (better than Sho did, at least).

“Why are you telling me this?” Aiba’s voice was quiet when he finally responded, and Ohno almost didn’t hear him at first.

“I wanted—“

“I don’t like this,” he spoke louder now, and Ohno was surprised to hear a hint of anger in his voice. “It’s easier to tell with me, right? You can just look at me and know if I’m lying? Is that why?”

“That’s not—“ Sho sounded surprised, and Ohno shifted in his seat, wondering if he should do something.

“So what am I supposed to do now, confess? I can’t even tell what you’re seeing or-or feeling, or whatever. Can you really guess just based on that?”

“Aiba-chan, I’m not trying to—“

“That’s why you waited til Nino wasn’t here, so you could find out stuff without him in the way?” Aiba actually sounded pretty upset, and judging by their shadows, both he and Sho were standing now.

“Please, let me speak,” one shadow reached out toward the other, a hand carefully resting on a shoulder. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I promise, I don’t mean you or Nino any harm.”

The second shadow moved with Aiba’s shaky breath, but didn’t pull away from the other.

“I’m an empath, and I can’t turn that off. That information is just always there for me. And I do act on that sometimes, but I’m not trying to manipulate you. It’s true that I wanted to speak with you alone, but honestly I didn’t really need you to confirm what I guessed. I had a lot of reasons to think so.”

Aiba sat down abruptly and Sho followed, letting his hand move away from Aiba’s arm.

“For what it’s worth, if I asked Nino straight, he wouldn’t be able to hide a lie from me either. This isn’t about you being easier to read or anything like that. I wanted to talk to you first because I knew if I had this conversation with Nino alone, or even with both of you, I would wake up the next day and you two would be gone.”

“What do you mean?” Aiba’s voice was quiet again, maybe a little subdued.

“I mean that Nino’s constantly afraid that someone’s going to find out and turn you guys in. If I talked to him, he’d nod and smile and then get you to leave with him as soon as he had a chance.”

“You think I won’t tell him?” Aiba didn’t sound impressed.

“I think he’ll listen to you, where he wouldn’t listen to me. And I think that you’ll listen to me when I tell you that you guys are safe here, and that I want to help.”

“So I’m just easier to trick than him?” A sharp retort.

“I’m not trying to trick anyone.” Sho sounded frustrated now. “What I’m trying to say is that you’re more willing to trust, where Nino won’t, or can’t. I’m asking you to give him a reason to stay.”

Aiba was quiet again, and Ohno realized that he was gripping his pencil tight enough that the wood was starting to creak. He set it down as Sho continued.

“I think the past few weeks have been stressful for you guys, keeping this a secret from us. But even with that, I’ve enjoyed having you as housemates, and it seems like Ohno has too. We don’t have a lot here, but I get the impression you’ve found this place to be pretty comfortable. I’d hate for you to have to leave and end up in a more dangerous situation just because we couldn’t resolve this.” A pause, then Sho spoke again, softer. “Nino’s smart, and you’re strong, and that’s kept you safe so far. But I think there’s been a lot of luck involved too. He was so scared when he brought you here that first night, and I don’t think anyone should have to feel like that.”

Ohno twisted his fingers together, remembering that night, almost a month ago now.

“What makes you think he’ll stay even if I tell him all that?” Aiba’s shadow looked smaller, somehow.

“I don’t think just you telling him will make him stay, honestly. But I’m pretty certain he won’t leave without you.”

Aiba was quiet again, probably in agreement. Ohno even agreed, the two’s strong bonds evident even after such a short time knowing Aiba.

“I’m sorry to put you in this position, but it feels like it was inevitable, and I wanted to have a chance to, I guess, present my case...Well, it’s your decision in the end.” Silence, again, and Sho cleared his throat awkwardly. “I’ll be in my room if you want to talk about it more.”

His shadow elongated then disappeared as he got up and went back inside, but Aiba’s stayed curled into itself, unmoving. Ohno watched him for a long moment, then picked his pencil back up and slowly started to draw again. He wasn’t really in the mood anymore, but for some reason he couldn’t bring himself to leave Aiba alone with only his miserable-looking shadow for company. 

It wasn’t until maybe an hour or so later that he finally got up and stretched as the balcony light was turned off. He’d made several strange half-sketches that he would have to see again in daylight to see if they were worth anything. Part of him was curious about Aiba, and if he had decided something, but he doubted Aiba would appreciate knowing that Ohno had overheard their conversation. 

Instead, he checked that his phone was plugged in with his alarm set, then flopped back on the couch with his blanket, flicking his fingers for a breeze to blow out the candle before he slept.


	7. Ch. 5 There Ain’t No Road Too Long If We Meet In The Middle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for waiting, here’s the next chapter :)

Nino leaned back against a cold slab of rock, shifting a bit when he realized his butt was starting to go numb. The rock was part of some sort of art installation/play area at the park, and it (along with the 7 other ones like it) was taller than most of the nearby trees. Nino generally avoided it during the daytime when he brought his guitar because kids tended to be clambering all over it. At the moment, however, it was late enough for the street lights to be on, and most of the foot traffic had passed by already. Nino had been one of those commuters, until he’d gotten...sidetracked.

He sighed, noting from his phone that he’d been out here for more than an hour already. So much for getting home early.

Not that today had been going that well anyway. Or, actually, things had been shitty since last night, maybe even the night before. Staying overnight at the clinic was never fun (the wifi was pretty crap), and then. Well.

“Do you think I’m ever gonna get to sleep in a futon again?” Nino asked idly, not really expecting an answer. “That crappy bed at the clinic two nights ago, then on the couch yesterday, in the park tonight…”

A hiccuped sob was the immediate reply, and Nino scrubbed his face with his hands.

“Y-you slept on-on the couch on your o-own,” Aiba managed to get out from the other side of the rock. He did not sound like he had calmed down at all, despite the few minutes of breathing exercises that they had been trying. Nino hadn’t really expected him to.

“Well, I was annoyed. I’m still annoyed.” Hearing what Sho had told Aiba, and then having to deal with Aiba quietly tell him that he was going to stay no matter what—it had been a lot, and Nino had lasted all of two seconds before he’d left their room. He’d ended up in the living room, pacing for hours (perhaps more anxious than annoyed, if he were honest). He couldn’t deny the truth of what Sho had said, but the thought of trusting someone he’d only known for a few short weeks was terrifying. 

Eventually he’d dozed off on the couch there, woken by everyone starting to get ready in the morning. He’d grabbed his stuff and left again, ignoring the way Sho kept looking at him and the way Aiba didn’t.

At this point, Nino was more tired than anything. 

Aiba sniffled behind him, and Nino tilted his head back, looking again at the stone slab that was separating them. This morning, this slab and the others had been in a rough circular shape, with enough space between them to fit five adults with their arms spread wide. The stones were heavy enough, and buried deep enough in the ground to stand through typhoons and earthquakes without moving a centimeter. So how odd he’d thought it when he’d passed by them walking home, only to see them clustered in a much tighter circle.

It was like someone had pushed them together, gathering them close enough that you couldn’t see or reach what was in the middle. Impossible without some ridiculously large equipment, but magic made such a thing much simpler.

Of course, earth magic was much rarer in Toracia than it had been in Karn, even now years after the war. Nino had yet to see a full Toracian with it, and even most of the Karnian immigrants didn’t have enough power to move earth this heavy.

His stupidly innocent, naive self of an hour ago had even thought, ‘Wow, someone’s got enough earth magic to rival Aiba-chan’s.’ To be fair to himself, his next thought had been, ‘Wait, shit—‘ and then, the grand finale after jogging over and hearing some very familiar crying: ‘Well, of course it is.’

Aiba, being Aiba, had managed to magically yank all the stones to his side, trapping himself in a stone circle. Not such a big deal, usually, but for some reason he’d been unable to put them back, leaving him effectively stuck.

Nino slid to the side, pillowing his head on his bag. “Have you tried telling the stones you don’t want them to move? A bit of reverse psychology, maybe?” Idly, he tried to push at the closest stone with one hand, and it unsurprisingly refused to budge.

“I d-don’t talk t-to stones Nino,” Aiba managed to sound frustrated despite the way his voice kept catching.

“Maybe you should try,” Nino grumbled, then sighed, “or maybe I should call Jun and get him to bring some blankets.”

As far as Nino could tell, the issue was that Aiba had panicked, and continued to be flustered and upset and unable to focus enough to move even one of the rocks, despite having pulled all eight at once before that. Nino had been trying to talk him down this past hour, but he hadn’t made much progress. He needed to calm Aiba down to get him out, but in true catch-22 fashion, there was no way Aiba was going to be able to calm down while he was still stuck.

Nino sat back up and sighed again, putting his chin in his hands. 

“Ni-Nino. You can, you can go h-home,” Aiba hiccuped out behind him. “It’s...it’s okay.”

Nino rolled his eyes. “Stupid,” he muttered, sitting back against the rock. “I’m not leaving.”

While true, that had Aiba outright crying once more, and Nino groaned, giving the stone an irritated whack.

“The hell am I supposed to do with you, seriously,” he grumbled, then paused, “...And what the hell is he doing here?”

“W-who?” 

“Hang on a minute,” Nino responded, grabbing his bag and jogging back out to the walking path where he’d just seen Sakurai Sho starting to approach.

“Nino, hello,” Sho looked a bit surprised to see him. “You don’t usually walk home this late.”

“Why are you here?” Nino snapped back. Perhaps it was irrational, but he couldn’t help but see the current situation as being mostly Sho’s fault. If Sho hadn’t gone and pushed Aiba into a corner, Aiba probably wouldn’t have been upset enough to get himself stuck like this. 

Sho didn’t seem bothered by the hostility, but he did give Nino a confused look.

“I was...walking home?”

“You don’t usually walk this way,” Nino countered.

“I thought I’d grab some cakes for dessert for everyone today,” he showed Nino the bag on his wrist. “It seemed like Aiba spoke with you last night, and I wanted to apologize for, well, forcing the issue.” He peered around himself, other hand fidgeting with his suit jacket, then tugging on his tie. “Is he here? I thought I felt—“

Nino exhaled in frustration, and Sho glanced back at him, shifting in place. “I don’t know about—why are you so fidgety?” Nino couldn’t help but be distracted by the other man’s restless movements. 

“Ah, sorry, it’s—empaths can be influenced by other people’s emotional states, and while I usually would have my shields up better, I thought it felt a bit like Aiba-chan? I was trying to find him, but it’s not really suited for tracking people down...is he here, do you know?”

Nino squinted at him. “Can you affect someone’s emotions? Like, get them to calm down?”

“Potentially, but—“

“I’m not talking about potential, just give me a yes or no.”

Sho sighed. “Yes, I do have some ability to influence emotions.” He rubbed his forehead, then gave Nino a tired look. “Where is he? What happened?”

Nino was still annoyed, but he couldn’t help glancing over towards the rocks. Sho followed his gaze and frowned, but started moving, and Nino quickly grabbed his arm and yanked him back. Sho turned to look at him again, clearly frustrated.

“Nino—“

“What does it matter to you?” Nino asked abruptly, and Sho stared at him.

“If I can help, I want to—”

“Why?”

Sho snorted, then held out his free hand, letting Nino see how much it was shaking. “I can call it a selfish motivation if you want me to. What kind of person would I have to be to literally feel someone else’s pain and not want to do anything about it?” He clenched his hand into a fist and turned to keep moving, but Nino refused to budge.

“What about MatsuJun then?” Nino finally let go of Sho’s arm when he turned back again, face tense. “You know how many times I’ve fixed him? Are you gonna tell me you didn’t know about that?”

Sho looked back at him, then away, down to the ground. “I knew...there was something wrong. I had a guess or two what, but. Nothing ever happened when I was there, and I could never get MatsuJun to trust me enough to talk about it.” 

He sighed, shoulders slumping a bit. “And I was younger and stupid and... I think I talked to the wrong person about it. An advisor at my school, but I’ve learned since that he’s good friends with...with the man in question. Very soon after that, I was told they didn’t need my services anymore. I never had Jun’s number or anything, and I only managed to run into one of his brothers once...I didn’t want to screw it up more than I already had, but in the end I talked to him about it...I don’t know if that helped or made things worse.”

Nino listened with one hand wound through the strap of his bag, clenching it tightly before finally letting it go. “He says things are better when his brothers are around to...intervene…” Nino admitted, and Sho looked a little relieved. Then he winced, bringing his hand up to rub at his temples.

“Please, let me help Aiba-chan. He’s getting more upset.”

“...He doesn’t like small spaces,” Nino reluctantly told him, gripping the strap of his bag again. He glanced back over to where Aiba was trapped. “Sounds like his shirt got snagged when he was walking by one of those rocks, and he...panicked.”

“I’m assuming there was earth magic involved?” Sho asked, starting to move again.

Nino made a face. “He was born with an overabundance of it,” he complained as he trotted to keep up.

When they got close enough to hear Aiba’s hiccuping sobs again, Nino raised his voice. “I told you I wasn’t leaving!” 

“I know, I know, but—“ Aiba’s voice was near-frantic, like he’d sounded an hour ago. “But it’s dark, and I can’t move and—“

“We agreed we weren’t going to think about that! We agreed that we were gonna think about the cute hamsters instead!”

“We said goats, not hamsters!” Aiba practically wailed in response, and Nino groaned, absently tugging his mask back up his nose.

“Sho-chan is here,” he added belatedly, and Sho gave him an exasperated look as Aiba made an anxious noise.

“Aiba-chan?” Sho called out in the brief gap. “Can you hear me?”

“Y-yeah, I can.”

“Great, so there’s no need to yell then,” Sho said, giving Nino a Look. Nino huffed and crossed his arms. “Well, it seems like we need you to move these back, huh? But you’re having a bit of trouble. So I’m gonna help a bit, okay? I’m gonna try and basically turn the volume down in your head a bit, make it easier to find what you’re looking for. It won’t hurt you, and it won’t last more than a little bit, okay?”

There was silence for a long moment before Aiba asked in a shaky voice, “Nino?”

Nino pressed his lips together, staring at Sho who met his gaze patiently. Finally, he sighed, slipping into Karnian as he answered, “It’s okay Ma-chan. Let him help you.”

“...Okay,” Aiba’s voice was small.

Nino watched as Sho moved as close as he could to the rocks, then started to talk to Aiba, harmless questions about his day and what goats he’d been talking about earlier. If Nino hadn’t been standing right next to him, he might not even have noticed the soft red glow in his eyes, and trailing a bit from his fingertips. 

Honestly Nino was relieved to be able to see it. If there hadn’t been magic involved, it would’ve meant that Sho was helping Aiba more doing basically the same thing Nino had been earlier, and that rankled. Magic, at least, he could deal with.

And indeed, it was only a few more minutes before Aiba’s own green energy was spreading through the rocks and the ground beneath them. Sho and Nino backed away as the rocks slowly slid back to their former positions, leaving just Aiba in the middle, hands slightly outstretched as the last bits of his magic faded.

Aiba was staring at his feet now, clearly a bit more in control of himself and feeling ashamed. Nino eyed the tracks the rocks had left, but didn’t say anything about them, just casually started trying to smooth some of them over with his feet.

“How are you doing?” he heard Sho ask Aiba, but it was quiet, and Nino kept kicking at the ground until suddenly it lit up again. He watched as the dirt and rocks shifted around, finally settling back down once the tracks were no longer obvious. Nino frowned at the sight, not excited about losing his stalling method.

“Nino,” Aiba spoke finally. Nino waited a second, then another, but finally he gave in and looked up, actually meeting Aiba’s teary gaze this time. “Nino, we can...we can leave. I—if you want to leave, we’ll go.”

Nino could see Sho shift slightly out of the corner of his eye, but he stayed quiet and Nino grimaced, listening as Aiba spoke again.

“I think...I think we should stay, but wherever Nino is, that’s fine. I…” he trailed off helplessly for a moment. “You’re always fixing everything I mess up, and I can’t just—whatever you want to do, Nino.” He sniffled, and wiped his face with the back of his hand.

Nino stared for a long moment, then sighed. “It’s the other way around, stupid,” he muttered, ignoring how Aiba shook his head in reply. 

He hadn’t once actually believed Aiba’s threat to stay without him, though the thought of it had made his stomach churn in distress. Aiba was too kind, and Nino had known that if he had pushed the issue last night, they would have been gone by morning. For better or worse though, Nino hadn’t had the conviction for that. He liked Ohno and Sho, and knew in his head at least that this was probably the safest place they had lived since coming to Toracia, maybe even before. He hadn’t been able to convince himself that leaving would be worth any of what it would cost him.

Nino crossed his arms to steady himself, then turned to face Sho properly. “So Oh-chan’s fine with this?”

“I haven’t discussed your...situation with him. But I think you know as well as I do that he won’t care about those sorts of...legal issues. He likes you both, that’s all he’s concerned about.” Sho’s tone was frank, not particularly pitying, which Nino appreciated. He continued, “If it’s alright, I’ll talk about it with him and make sure.”

Nino shrugged in agreement.

“So...we’re staying?” Aiba was looking between them in confusion, rubbing at his arms now.

“Guess so,” Nino said with a sigh. He’d honestly made up his mind this afternoon for the most part, but he’d wanted a chance to talk with Sho again, see where he was coming from. He watched as Sho shrugged out of his suit jacket (nearly dropping the cakes in the process) in order to wrap it around Aiba’s shoulders. Aiba managed a weak smile in gratitude and Nino sighed again. Yeah, alright.

By some unspoken decision, they all turned to start walking back to the apartment. For a few minutes all Nino could hear was their soft footsteps. Then, as they passed under the footbridge near the apartment, Sho spoke again.

“I think we need to iron out the details of everything too, but maybe we can take a rain check on that.”

Nino nodded, feeling exhausted down to his toes, but paused when Sho continued, “I think I might be...unavailable for the next few days.”

His tone was odd, and Nino swiveled around to look at him properly, but Sho was the one avoiding his gaze now.

“You mean the sleeping thing?” Aiba asked, managing to be both tactless and helpful as he crossed his arms under Sho’s jacket.

“Yeah...um—“

“Oh no, because you helped me?” Aiba looked anxious again suddenly, and Sho hurriedly put a hand on his shoulder, shaking his head.

“It honestly doesn’t seem to matter how physically tired I am. I’ve had spells on easy days and on hard ones. It just...happens.” There was an undercurrent of frustration in his voice.

“I could try and see if there’s something I can do—“ Nino started to offer a hand but Sho shook his head again and Nino frowned, letting it drop back down.

“That’s kind of... I actually have a condition, about you guys staying. Well, Nino. Um.”

Nino felt the smooth fabric of Sho’s jacket brush his shoulder as Aiba shifted closer to him, a hand loosely gripping the bottom of his shirt. He nudged the other boy to let go as he watched Sho in confusion.

“Sorry to bring this up now, but, yeah. I...I don’t want you to heal me. Um, ever.” Perhaps Sho felt the way Nino’s stomach roiled at his words, because he quickly added, “Oh, but, this isn’t personal, please don’t think that. There’s...I never. Never go to healers. Um. I don’t…” He trailed off awkwardly.

It was the least composed Nino had ever seen him, and it dampened his initial indignation. He kept quiet as Aiba responded in his place.

“What, like never? But Nino wouldn’t make you pay lots of money, or anything, so—“

“It’s not about the money,” Sho’s voice was quiet, “I just can’t—do that.”

“But—“ Aiba stopped when Nino nudged him again.

“Never as in 100% never? Life-or-death situation, you’d rather die?” His tone was skeptical, but he wondered if Aiba could feel him shaking. The thought of having to watch someone, a friend, die right in front of him when he could have done something about it—he didn’t like it at all.

“I—“ Sho licked his lips, glancing up to Nino then back down again. “If I can trust your judgment…”

“It’s not the type of thing I’d make a mistake on,” Nino bit out, and Sho winced.

“Of course not...If you can promise that you’d only do it if there was no other choice, then...that would be acceptable, I think.” He didn’t look entirely happy with that, but Nino supposed that made two of them. Three, if Aiba shifting anxiously between them meant anything.

Nino chewed his lip, glancing over to Aiba before he finally answered, “I can promise that. Your body, your rules.” Aiba opened his mouth, then looked to Sho, face uneasy.

Sho looked a little relieved as he ducked his head in thanks.

They were quiet the rest of the way to the apartment though Aiba was clearly dying to ask Sho a million rude questions. At least he was distracted from what had happened earlier, Nino supposed.

Ohno peered out from the kitchen when they came through the door, looking puzzled to see them all together.

“You’re late,” he told Nino, who huffed, setting his bag in the corner and taking off his mask.

“There are three of us here, why are you picking on me?” Aiba slid by behind him, heading for their room, and Nino scowled.

“You’re never late. It’s weird. I made dinner.”

“Learn to have a proper conversation,” Nino grumbled as Sho set the cake bag down on the table and tugged on Ohno’s sleeve.

“Niisan, sorry, I have to sleep.” For all that Ohno usually looked so expressionless, Nino could swear that he saw disappointment flicker over his face. It settled into a more common “stubbornness” after a moment, and Nino raised an eyebrow as Ohno disappeared back into the kitchen.

He was back in only a moment or two, shoving a bowl of something hot into Sho’s face.

“Eat first,” he insisted, only backing up for a moment to grab some chopsticks that he’d apparently forgotten.

Sho did look like he was on the verge of finding a flat surface and passing out, but he gamely took the bowl and began to eat as Ohno watched over him with narrowed eyes.

Nino took the chance to grab his things and also head towards their room. He found Aiba sitting there, cross-legged with his hands twisting around themselves in his lap. Aiba looked up when he came in, and the bright light in the room highlighted his red eyes and splotchy cheeks. Nino contemplated turning right back around, but that would probably lead to sleeping on the couch again so he grit his teeth and stepped in.

“I’m sorry,” Aiba told him in a soft voice, and Nino turned away from him, dropping his bag by the door. 

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” he finally responded, still looking away. “Oh-chan made dinner, let’s go eat before he gets grumpy.”

He heard Aiba moving behind him, jumping slightly when he was wrapped in a hug from behind.

A “thank you” was whispered hoarsely into his neck, and he shrugged. 

“I didn’t do anything,” he informed Aiba, but the other boy just shook his head, squeezing him once more before moving past him out into the hallway.

Nino watched him go for a moment, then sighed, turning off the light and trotting to keep up.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading :) Hope to be back with more soon.


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